


there's no pure way to say it

by apricotcake



Series: long is the road that leads me home [1]
Category: Captain America (Movies)
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Bisexual Bucky Barnes, Bisexual Steve Rogers, Captain America: The First Avenger, Catholicism, Historical Inaccuracy, Internalized Homophobia, Loss of Faith, M/M, Multi, Non-Consensual Body Modification, Non-Consensual Drug Use, POV Second Person, Period Typical Attitudes, Period-Typical Homophobia, Pining, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Pre-Captain America: The First Avenger, Romani Bucky Barnes, Slow Burn, Suicidal Thoughts, Torture, if it makes you feel any better im romani and im not just throwing it around, the g slur is used here quite a few times
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-18
Updated: 2020-01-18
Packaged: 2021-02-27 16:08:28
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 3
Words: 107,337
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22289947
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/apricotcake/pseuds/apricotcake
Summary: Ma always says you’re gonna grow up handsome because you have gadjo blood, she says Becca’ll grow up pretty because of it, too, but there’s nothing wrong with Ma’s blood, and you think she’s pretty. She’s showed you pictures of her brothers—your uncles, Peter and James—and they’re handsome, with dark eyes and long straight noses and black hair, skin like hers, too, tanned even in the grey.It takes too long for you to realize she meant you’ll grow up just fine, because you look like your father, who looked like everyone else.
Relationships: James "Bucky" Barnes/Original Character(s), James "Bucky" Barnes/Steve Rogers
Series: long is the road that leads me home [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1604464
Comments: 66
Kudos: 134





	1. PART I: 1925-1940

**Author's Note:**

> title is from 'unfinished duet' by richard siken
> 
> NOW WITH LOVELY ART BY [MIDDIMIDORI](https://twitter.com/middimidori/status/1227993521551921152?s=21) AND [ARSARTISF](https://twitter.com/arsartisf/status/1257835794787696640?s=21)!!
> 
> A [playlist](https://open.spotify.com/user/coconutmylk/playlist/28pgsQgQXURpWNMqg3KH8w?si=I8yaccG4RSiXqwiU9cWj8w) by yours truly :’)

You are born screaming.

You are born in the midst of a war that almost tears your family to shreds. It takes your father to the front lines and it nearly kills him but he comes back without a scratch, comes back only to die in 1921, days after the birth of your sister.

You were four years old. You remember nothing of it, but you know of it. His death was in the paper because he was a war hero, a young man with a wife and children who died after doing his duty. It has a copy of a picture Ma has at home, him decked in his dress uniform, cap slightly crooked on his head, his face young and serious. It’s one of the only photos left of George Barnes, aside from the one from the wedding.

In that, he’s tall and wiry, clean shaven with a smile and holding your ma’s hand. She’s short and slim with dark hair and darker skin than his. It’s a good picture. You always thought they looked happy, and maybe they would have continued being happy when they were old, too, like Mr. and Mrs. O’Halloran from next door.

You say as much to your ma one day, and she gets tight-lipped and sad, so you don’t mention it anymore.

-

You grow up knowing you’re different. Ma tells you so, and tells you more and more the older you get. When you get a little smarter, you notice the dirty looks she gets, or the way some of the folks in Vinegar Hill don’t want to be bothered with any of you.

-

You get along easier in the world than she does, because you have your pop’s eyes and nose and smile. 

Ma always says you’re gonna grow up handsome like him because you have gadjo blood, she says Becca’ll grow up pretty because of it, too, but there’s nothing wrong with Ma’s blood, and you think she’s pretty. She’s showed you pictures of her brothers—your uncles, Peter and James—and they’re handsome, with dark eyes and long straight noses and black hair, skin like hers, too, tanned even in the grey.

It takes too long for you to realize she meant _you’ll grow up just fine, because you look like your father, who looked like everyone else._

-

Your name is James Buchanan Barnes, because your ma and your pop wanted you to have a good strong name, but no one calls you by it unless you’re in real big trouble.

Ma calls you Jamie or James and sometimes Yasha, but one day, Rebecca calls you Bucky and it sticks like glue. You like it. James means supplanter, and you don’t like the meaning when it’s explained to you at mass, so you ask Ma one day, “What’s Winifred mean?”

“It means peacemaker, chavo,” she says, and then looks to your sister. “Rebecca means beautiful, James means—”

“What do ya think Bucky means?”

The lights are off and the windows are open. It’s dark out, but it’s still hot. You can see your mother only by the burning ember of her cigarette. She shrugs, and grins. “I don’t know,” she says, and then pokes you lightly in your stomach. “But I think it means handsome.”

“Does not!” Becca shouts, and your ma hisses _osh_ , because you can’t wake the O’Hallorans. The three of you still laugh, just quieter than before.

-

Every day is the same. You and Becca go to school, and Ma goes to work in Clinton Hill. You’d walk home together usually but Becca spent the day with the O’Hallorans because she was feeling sick, and they promised your ma she’d be just fine.

You do well in school. Rebecca’s good with numbers, and you’re good with writing, even though your teacher says you have the worst penmanship in her class. That’s on her for making you use your right hand. 

On your way home, fall air crisp on your skin, you hear shouting.

“Had enough, Rogers?”

Someone coughs instead of answering, and then, another voice says, “Hit him again, Frankie!”

A crack of knuckle to flesh.

You’re eight years old. You don’t get into fights.

You don’t get into fights because your ma would tan your hide worse than any kid from school would if she heard you got into one. She’d always tell you to be careful of fighting, just in case whoever was trying to punch your lights out learned too much about you and wanted to take their hatred out on you, and you’re not the type to go looking for trouble, anyhow.

But there’s a kid getting the daylights knocked out of him, and Ma always says to pull your weight or go where you’re needed, so it’s not breaking any rules. You remember to tell her so if she asks. She’s real understanding that way.

So, you turn the corner instead of continuing straight toward your building, and you see it all at the edge of an alley. Four boys, three against one. 

You know these boys. You know their faces, and they’ve always been alright with you, not mean and not nice either. The Winslow twins—Archie and Frank—, and Tommy Corcoran.

“Hey!” you shout before you can stop yourself, and all four heads turn. “Why don’t you pick on someone your own size?”

They’re all your age, but Tommy is bigger and taller. “Yeah?” he calls, and drops the little kid like a sack of potatoes. “You offering, Barnes?”

“I just don’t think that’s a fair fight,” you say, and you come closer. “You okay there, pal?”

The kid, who’s not as young as you thought he was, wipes blood from his face and stares at you a little bitterly, before he gets up, a mess of knobby limbs and blond hair. “Yeah, but I can—“

Tommy punches him in the stomach, and he crumples back down, curls into himself and covers his head to stop any kicks from coming in, but Tommy’s looking straight at you instead.

“Stop sticking your nose in other people’s business, why don’t ya?” Frankie asks, and Archie says, “Yeah, beat it, gyp!”

It doesn’t get to you. It should, but you don’t allow it to. 

“Yeah, well, I live right around the corner,” you say with a shrug, and step closer. “So, this is my business. No beating on anyone on my side of town.”

That’s all it takes to get them angry, they forget about their target and come at you, but you know how to fight, even though you don’t want to. The landlord’s two sons, both older than you are, taught you how to block and how to throw a punch and how to knock big guys like Tommy Corcoran down. They told you not to tell a soul or they’d beat on you real bad, and you believed them for a second but then they laughed about it.

You use everything they taught you and then, the Winslows and Tommy are gone. Frank has a bloody lip and a black eye. You landed two strong kicks to Archie’s stomach, and Tommy got the wind knocked out of him before he twisted away from you and bolted from the alley.

You’re a little smug with yourself. You almost forget about the other kid until he pushes himself from his spot against the wall, readjusting his clothes. His trousers are ripped at the knee, shirt spotted with red.

“I had ‘em on the ropes, you know,” he grumbles, and wipes blood from his nose, dirt from his cheek. His eyes are dry. Any other kid would be teary-eyed and snotty now. “I didn’t need you to come help me.”

He almost seems angry about it, like he’s just as angry at you as he was at those boys.

You shrug. “I know, but a little help never hurts,” you say. “Hey, do you live around here, too? I bet you do. What’s your name, pal?”

The kid opens his mouth and says, “Stiof—“ and then he shuts up, mouth going tight before he speaks again. “Steve. Steven Grant Rogers.”

He has the whisper of an accent. Not Brooklyn, nowhere near it. You were born and raised here. You can practically smell it off of someone.

If you didn’t like him before, you think you like him now.

“Name’s James Buchanan Barnes,” you say, and stick out your hand for him to shake. There’s only a little bit of blood on it anyway. “I only let my friends call me Bucky, so you can call me that, too.”

Steve Rogers smiles at you, bright as the sun, and shakes your hand with a firm grip. You think you’d do anything to make him smile at you like that again.

-

From there on, everything changes. You never had any friends but Becca and Ma, and maybe the landlord’s boys, but they’re older, and Becca’s still a baby no matter what she says, and Ma is Ma. 

Steve is a year younger than you, but you both stick like glue and refuse to let go. Your teachers grow used to it, the other kids grow used to it. People rarely see one without the other. You’re _SteveandBucky_ , _BuckyandSteve_ , and you know it’ll be like that forever. Steve’s your best and only pal, and you’re his best and only pal. Neither of you want to change that.

-

Steve gets into scraps with everyone. That’s something you learn quickly.

He gets into scraps with the neighborhood boys, and the rich boys from Williamsburg and the altar boys from St. Joseph’s and whoever else looks at him wrong. Ma always shakes her head and says _dinlo raklo_. Mrs. Rogers calls him a spitfire, and you call him a dumb punk.

Other people called him names, too. Mick and fairy and other things they spat out with venom on their tongues, but he never reacted to that. He never reacted unless it was at someone else’s expense.

-

When you're fifteen and he's fourteen, someone calls you _good-for-nothing_ and _dirty_ and _fucking gypsy rat_ and Steve gives the guy two black eyes and a split lip for his troubles. It's one of the first fights he wins without your help.

-

The Rogerses are a little family, like yours. It’s just Steve and Mrs. Rogers-who-says-call-me-Sarah in their little tenement in Vinegar Hill, just like you and your ma, except they don’t have a Becca. Steve says he wishes he had a sister sometimes, and you say, _no you don’t,_ because Rebecca may be younger, but she’s a terror.

Ma invites Steve and Mrs. Rogers over for dinner every Sunday after church, and at first you think it’s because she knows Steve’s your pal, but it turns out that she and Mrs. Rogers get along like a house on fire, too. Talking and laughing for most of the evening.

Later on, lying on your bedroom floor with a comic book opened in front of you, Steve says, “My ma doesn’t laugh like that too much,” and you say, “Mine either.”

-

One Sunday, Steve doesn’t show up for mass. Just Mrs. Rogers, and when you ask why, Mrs. Rogers tells you Steve’s too sick to come out. She tells your Ma that she thought Steve would have an easier winter, but she supposes not.

You want to ask more questions. Even when she walks away, but Ma says _mekh la_ , _Jamie,_ and holds you back. When she catches you trying to sneak out, trying to make your way to the Rogerses building, she tells you to kneel in front of the ikana and pray for Steve instead of bothering him while he’s sick.

She kneels beside you, and listens as you pray, eyes flickering from the rosaries draped over the edges of the shelf, wrapped around bottles of holy water and holy oil, to the statues of the Virgin Mary and Christ on the cross, St. Jude and Michael the Archangel. _Please, God, watch over Stevie for me. Let him get better soon, and make sure he comes to school and to mass on Sunday. Watch over Mrs. Rogers, and help her stop worrying so much. She’s a real sweet lady, she shouldn’t be so sad all the time._

You know that in your bones. Neither Ma or Sarah Rogers should be worrying like this, even while the world is falling apart around the five of you.

-

You learn that Steve always gets sick. 

Not the way you get sick when it’s winter, or when you stay outside too long or play out in the rain. Steve gets sick _all the time_. Coughing and wheezing with fevers that make him loopy and miserable, even when you do your best to cheer him up. You sit at the foot of his bed while Mrs. Rogers goes to work at the hospital, and she tells you to ask her landlord to use the phone if Steve doesn’t feel well. She says she’ll come right home if that’s the case.

But, you think Steve feels a little better when you come around, even when his eyes are dark and he has a sheen of sweat on his greyish skin. You laugh and talk about nothing and read whatever you brought along and you help him with his homework. He’s sick so often he usually falls behind on it, misses days and days worth of school.

“You should have a show on the radio, Buck,” Steve tells you, once you’re elbow deep in Moby Dick. He’s sat up in bed, a little bit of color back in his face. “You got the voice for it.”

“Nah,” you say, and wave him off. “I just like reading. Ma says I’m the best reader in her family. She told me her big brother couldn’t spell his own _name_.”

You don’t elaborate on why, but it’s easy to guess. Ma says that most people in her family didn’t go to school, until her and her littlest brother, that a lot of families are like that.

Steve doesn’t need to know everything, anyway. Nobody needs to know everything about you.

-

Maybe it’s crazy, but you think Steve might hate you if he learns everything about you. And you clam up the day Mrs. Rogers finally asks, “Your ma’s a traveler, isn’t she, James?”

That’s another word for it. Not a bad word, but still a word to describe it. 

You like Mrs. Rogers. Trust her. You know she wouldn’t say boo to you, but your stomach still sours like you’ve eaten something bad, or like you’ve been caught doing something you shouldn’t have done at all when the question comes, your shoulders tense, climb up to your ears.

You catch her gaze, blue like Steve’s, just as kind but much more patient. “You’re not mad?” you ask.

 _That_ makes her mad. “Why would I be?” she asks, blonde brows drawn tight.

“People don’t like us when we say so,” you tell her. It’s the first time you’ve ever told anyone that, and you can barely look up while you speak. “Ma says to say we’re Italian in case anyone asks, but you and Steve never asked, so if you’re—“

“I’m _not_ angry, James,” she says, and you’re surprised when she reaches across the table and takes your hand in hers, leans in a little closer to catch your eyes. “In fact, I think I like you a bit more. You’re tough as nails, all three of you.”

Maybe that makes your chest swell a little, but you don’t say that. Not out loud. “Thanks, Mrs. Rogers,” you say instead. “And I’m real sorry about yesterday, by the way. I don’t want Steve in any trouble.”

"We both know who started the trouble, dearest," she says with Steve's smirk, and squeezes your fingers. "And call me Sarah from now on, will you?"

-

In 1930, Steve gets so sick with scarlet fever, Sarah has a priest come to his bedside and give him his last rites.

Because you're a coward, you run. You don't stay with Steve even though he asks. Even though he says, in a voice that rips your heart to shreds, "Buck? Where’re you going?”

The night is heavy on your shoulders when you make it outside, and you run as fast as you can.

You run all the way to your apartment, and Ma is outside leaning against the balcony with her cigarette, and her skin turns ashen when she sees you. "So keres?" she asks in a rush, and then all but chases you inside when you don't answer. "Jamie!"

You’re looking for something, but you don’t know what. Your bones feel wrong in your skin. 

"What happened?" she presses, and grabs your shoulders tight. Makes you look at her. "Tell me, James.”

You can't speak. Your eyes are burning. Your lungs are so tight and so painful, and you can barely breathe. You wonder if this is how Steve feels. "I—Steve," you start, and swallow, shake your head quickly. "It’s Steve. Ma, he's—“

Her face falls. "Don't tell me that," she says. "James, te merav—“

"Last rites," you puff out finally, and it's with a sob. "There's a priest in his room and he's giving him his last rites!"

You don’t cry. You never cry. Not because it’s for pansies or because someone told you not to, you just _don’t_.

But, you’re crying now. Your body is numb with it even when Ma squeezes you tight, even when your fingers twist in the back of her dress. You barely hear it when she tells you Steve will be fine, but you hear it when she says that if he isn’t, he’ll be just fine where he’s going.

“I gotta go back,” you croak against her shoulder. “I gotta see him if he’s gonna—“

Ma says you can’t go back. It’s the first fight you ever have. 

-

You don’t sleep. You’re shaking for hours in your bed, and it feels as hard as a rock beneath your back. You make your way to the living room, and sleep with a pillow and a sheet on the drafty floor by the ikana.

You know you can’t pray all night, but that doesn’t mean you don’t try. You pray until you’re simply begging with blurry eyes, already feeling loss in the pit of your stomach, _let him live, let him live, don’t take him from me, please, please, please._

-

Steve lives. 

It takes him forever to truly get better, but you think he’s too stubborn to die. It’s not his time, and you don’t know when his time will come, but you’ll do everything you can to stave it off.

-

You turn fourteen, and you grow and your bones ache. At fifteen, your voice drops deeper and finally stops cracking.

You shine shoes on a street corner next to the greengrocer, and then Mr. Trentini, who owns the place, asks if you’d like a little extra money, so you get strong from moving boxes of produce and cases of milk around, hauling sacks of flour. Your arms turn hard and wiry, corded with muscle. 

The girls at school look at you different after that, with color in their cheeks and giggles and whispers you can’t quite hear. Ann Wieczorek shoulders her way up to you to say hello every morning, but never much else. You know she’s waiting for you to say something first, but you never do.

Steve asks why, and you have no answer.

Your summers are slow and hot and sticky. You and Steve spend days on the fire escape of his apartment, at Ebbets Field with the cheapest Dodgers tickets you can get your hands on, all the way up in the nosebleeds with the sun beating down on you and a hot dog split between you. The two of you even scrounge up enough money to go to Coney Island, and with Becca’s birthday so close, you bring her along, too. Pluck her away from her friends, and she sits on the train between you and Steve, buzzing with excitement.

See, Becca’s born in July, too. She turns eleven on the 3rd, and Steve turns fourteen on the 4th. So, going on the 2nd kills two birds with one stone.

It’s blazing hot, but the wind coming off the ocean is cool. Briny on your tongue. The salt turns your hair wavy, and turns Becca’s hair even curlier than it already was. You both tan easily and get darker as the day goes on, and right then, you realize how much you and Becca and Ma look alike.

Steve doesn’t tan. He’s milk white, and gets sunburned all over when he finally pushes out from under the umbrella. He laughs when you throw him into the ocean, when he pulls you into a chokehold and drags you further into the waves, and you shout, “Help! Somebody help! This mick’s tryin’ to drown me!”

It’s the last time you’ll be at eye level for a while. You’re growing like a weed, but Steve is just getting knobbier and bonier, with big hands and long, noodly arms. His age shows in his face, though. Shows in his eyes. Right now, though, his eyes are bright and clear. Like the sky. Like the ocean. His hair is plastered to his forehead, skin tacky with saltwater.

You look at Steve too often, lately.

You realize this on the boardwalk, when he’s watching the fireworks, and you’re watching him, illuminated in blue and green and red. You feel sick when he catches you, and you turn away. 

-

You don’t stop feeling sick, and soon, you’re on the subway, staring into space with Becca, sun-soaked and clutching the bear she’d won, sleeping against your shoulder. You feel like you’ve swallowed a live fish, like it’s flopping around where your stomach should be.

Steve nudges you with a bony elbow. “Hey,” he says, just low enough for you to hear, his sunburnt face all pinched up. “You okay?”  
  
“Long day,” you say, and it’s half-true. “Spent too much time looking at your ugly mug, Rogers.”

He tries not to laugh, and he rolls his eyes. “You’re such a jerk.”

“That’s real rich coming from you.”

Steve elbows you in the ribs, just hard enough for you to feel the _go fuck yourself_ he definitely wants to say.

It’s late. You’re delirious with it, and so is Steve, and it makes everything funnier than it really is. You try not to wake Becca with your laughing, and your stomach aches with it, worsens when Steve turns tomato red and coughs and laughs and coughs again.

It does nothing to ease the guilt trying to eat you whole, but it does ease the tension in your shoulders. 

-

You start waking up tense and shaky all over, and you’ve heard the guys from school talking about having dirty dreams and such, but they talked about it so easy.

You didn’t think they’d leave you with such a sense of dread.

You have them all the time now, and you feel filthy with it, like sin incarnate, so you start to pay attention during mass, You try to swallow down everything you’re feeling, but Steve sits in the pew across from you, and when you watch his hair fall in his eyes or the way his fingers worry at the worn cover of his Bible, any sort of progress you make goes straight down the tubes.

-

Because of this, you finally start hanging around Ann Wieczorek. On your first date, you kiss her goodnight, slow and soft and lingering, and feel nothing.

She’s over the moon about it, and you should be sweet on her, because she _is_ pretty, all auburn ringlets and big brown eyes, but you’re not. Not even a little. It takes the whole winter for her to call it quits with you, because you _only_ kiss her goodnight, and don’t ever ask her for anything else.

That’s enough for the other girls, though. You go on dates, and you’re real sweet and respectful and shake hands with the fathers of whoever you’re swinging with, and for a while you allow yourself to forget about Steve and the corruption growing inside of you, but the girls’ faces all blend into each other. You don’t think about them unless they’re standing in front of you.

You take a walk to the grocer’s and ask Mr. Trentini if he’ll take you on for weekends, if you can come by after school. He says yes, of course, and then, you’re too busy for dames. 

Then, you and Ma and Becca can breathe a little easier. You don’t have to worry about the rent so much now. You don’t have to worry about the three of you getting kicked to the curb, and the old man lets you take whatever’s about to go off the shelves, or whatever there’s too much of and _‘can’t go to waste,’_ so you get good bread and not-so-nice pieces of meat but times are hard, and you’ll take what you can get and be grateful for it.

Besides, working is a better distraction than Ann, or Mavis, or Joan, or Nancy, because Steve is working after school, too. You see less of each other. You aren’t sure how you feel about that, but you think you’re getting over whatever you were feeling for him, so it’s not so bad.

-

Mr. Trentini dies the day after Christmas in ‘34, and since he doesn’t have anyone to take over for him, the greengrocer shuts down. 

You’re without a job and you think you might have a hand for body work, for working around a garage even if you’re just answering the phone, but Ma thinks it’s a bad idea. You know the reason why, but you still push. The two of you bicker about it for a few days, too much stubbornness from both of you.

Between you being out of a job, and Ma not getting paid nearly enough at the office, she gets heat from the landlord about the rent, and he says that he’s giving her a week to move out unless she can pay up.

That shuts you both up fast, and an air falls over your house so thickly, it feels like you might choke on it.

You’ve seen too many people get kicked out of their homes already, and that same evening, while Ma is out of earshot, Rebecca asks you, quiet for once in her life, “Buck? Are we getting thrown out?”

“Nope,” you say, even though you don’t really believe it yourself. “We’re gonna be fine. Pinky promise.”  
  
Ma calls for you to come help her with something, and you find her in her room with a box on her nightstand.

“You can’t tell a soul, Jamie,” she says, eyes dark and serious. “No one, not even Steve, hal’arel?”

Before you can say yes, you understand, she opens the box.

She speaks to you, quickly and quietly—all in Romanes since Rebecca’s grasp of it is still pretty rusty, as old as she is—and tells you that she didn’t think it would get this bad, and that she hoped to save a few things for you and Becca, or maybe your kids when you have them one day.

Inside the box, there isn’t much, but if it’s all sold, you’ll all be set for a long, long while. 

You won’t have to worry about missing the rent, or choosing between new shoes and food. Becca’s getting taller, getting growing pains that make her curl up and cry on the sofa while Ma rubs arnica salve on the backs of her knees. She’ll need new clothes, a bigger bed soon. Your Sunday best is far from being the best. Ma’s coat is getting holes in it.

This could change all of that.

“Ma,” you say, and you spot her and Pop’s wedding bands in there, along with her engagement ring. You see a pair of earrings, a gold coin, a bracelet, a silver pocket watch of your pop’s. All untouched, in desperate need of a good polishing. “We don’t gotta sell all of it if that’s all you got left.”

“Yes, we do,” Ma says when she sees you eyeing the contents of the box. “We can’t be greedy now, chavo. This isn’t about me, this isn’t about _things_ . This is about _us_. All of us. Do you think I like seeing you working? Do you think I liked seeing you busting your ass at the greengrocer?”

The language doesn’t phase you, because Ma cursed more than anyone you knew. Hell, more than you and Steve did, and it’s bound to rub off on you as time goes on. “Guess not,” you say after a while, low and quiet, because you like being wrong about as much as she does.

She shrugs. “Then come to the city with me tomorrow.”

-

You go to Manhattan with her. You look at the skyscrapers, and the well-to-do in their tailored coats and clothes that weren’t handed from family member to family member, and then you end up at a jeweler’s, where you and Ma take care of business.

The rent is paid. The three of you have enough money to breathe, and more than enough stashed away. 

You’re relieved, because you don’t find any work for over six months after that.

-

Some crazy part of you plans to buy everything back one of these days, even though you know it’ll all be sold soon enough. Even if you could replace it somehow, you wonder if that would be enough.

You and Steve are walking around Williamsburg one evening, and you see a pocket watch in a shop window that looks an awful lot like your father’s, and it’s not the same one, not by a longshot, but it sure is nice. You don’t say much about it, but Steve catches your eyes on the window.

-

  
During those six months, you feel like you’re floating, but you don’t think you’re alone in that. 

Everyone you know has a pinched, tense expression, even the older guys from school. A lot of them have dropped out to work, since they all have a ton of mouths to feed at home. Even though your family’s alright with money, you’ve been thinking about it a lot yourself. 

_Think_ being the keyword, since you know you’d be torn a new one if you did.

You never end up following through with it, mainly since you don’t want to see the look on Ma’s face when you tell her you dropped out. You tell Steve as much during another sweltering summer, sat out on the fire escape of his tenement. You snuck a couple of beers out from a crate down the street, and maybe it doesn’t go too well with the apple cake, leftover from Steve’s birthday. maybe it doesn’t taste so good warm, but it might be the best thing you’ve had in a long while.

“You got a lot going on up here, Buck,” Steve says, and pokes you in the temple with a sticky finger. “It’d be a shame if you let all that go.”

“I just don’t like sitting on my ass anymore. No one wants to take me on unless it’s full-time anyway.” you say, and take a swig of your beer. Swish it in your mouth before you let yourself look at Steve properly for the first time in a long time, brow arched up. “And is that something nice I hear coming from you, Rogers?

“I’ll take it right back if ya want me to,” he says, and then he’s burying himself in his sketchbook again. “Jerk.”  
  
He keeps looking up at you, and you’re far too aware of the sweat on your skin, the hot air. You think about Coney Island and the fireworks as you take another swig, and then you turn back to Steve. “Whaddaya keep looking at me for? I got something on my face?”

Steve turns a shade darker and says, “Shut your trap and eat your damn cake, Barnes.”

“You know what? I will,” you say. “I haven’t had this since Christmas, and I got a lot more respect for your mama than I do for you, anyhow.”

You finish your slice and shut your eyes against the blazing July sun. Tilt your head back to feel its warmth. You can hear the scritch scratch of Steve’s pencil, hear kids playing on the street somewhere. “You think you wanna stay in Brooklyn, Steve?”

You don’t have to open your eyes to know what kind of face he’s making. Eyes on the skyline and mouth pressed tight. “You know what they say, home is home,” he says, like he’s thought about it before. “But there’s a lot of the world I’d wanna see.”  
  
It’s ridiculous, but you spit it out anyway. “Say.” Your throat is dry, your fingers itching to squeeze around the neck of the beer bottle. “When school’s all done, we should buy a car off someone, go see what else is out there. World don’t end at the East River, we both know that. We can go to Niagara Falls or something, or hell, go even further. We can go to Yellowstone and see the geysers, or go up to the Grand Canyon. Air’ll be good for your lungs out there. All hot and dry like they say it is.”

You crack an eye open, just in time to see him smiling, but not looking up. Thank God, he doesn’t notice you staring. “Whatever you’re planning, I’m right behind you,” Steve says, and you believe him. “You and me, and whatever car anyone’ll sell us.”

“You and me, pal,” you echo, half to yourself. For a second, it feels real. Like maybe the two of you might get out of here one day and come back under new steam.

There are too many maybes knocking around in your head.

-

The two of you stop talking about leaving Brooklyn soon after that, because Sarah Rogers is whisked off to the TB ward at Bellevue, and you both know she isn’t coming back.

-

You stay in school, and you graduate. Your teachers ask if you’re thinking about college, but you always find a way to weasel away from the subject.

Besides, Steve dropped out, since he needs to work full-time now. You try to help, slip him some cash, but he doesn’t let you. He’s too proud for that.

-

In her year and a half at the sanatorium, you see Sarah eight times. The first time is during the first few weeks she was admitted, and Ma and Becca were there too, but the three of you had to keep your distance, and you wanted Steve to have some time alone with Sarah, since none of you were sure how much of that there would be. The doctors don’t give any straight answers. They never do.

The other times, it’s you and Steve, and he doesn’t protest to you coming, but you just end up leaving him be for a while, waving through the window or popping in to say goodbye, because you don’t want to be a burden. 

Your time is occupied with looking for work, with carting Rebecca to and from school since Ma doesn’t like her walking alone anymore, and the guilt of not going eats you up.

The eighth time is because Steve asks you to come with him, all pushy and pretending that it’s not because he isn’t up to going alone. Of course, you say yes. You take the train to Manhattan with him, and he doesn’t even look up when you squeeze his shoulder. He just thrusts a telegram against your chest.  
  
“Doctors think it’s gonna be soon,” he says, strangled, like when his lungs aren’t giving him enough air. “Maybe tonight.”  
  
There are no words of comfort you can offer. You’ve always been honest with him, as honest as you can be, and there’s no use lying now.

You have a bad feeling about today. 

You hope to God you’re wrong.

-

You sit outside Sarah’s room, and you glance through the window, trying to ignore the persistent smell of death, of illness. Steve sits at the edge of her bed, as close as she’ll allow him. They’ve always been close. As long as you can remember, they’ve been close, and not even because they had to be. They were both full of piss and vinegar, but they could be soft around each other, stop putting up the barriers they showed the rest of the world.

So, you know they need this, need these last dregs of time together, but this place makes you edgy. The heaviness, the sallow faces, the old folks wandering, and God, the _kids_. You feel ready to jump out of your skin and then—

Then Sarah catches your eye through the little window, and she crooks her finger at you. For just a second, she looks so much like herself, unlike the frail, gaunt thing her sickness turned her into. For a second, her eyes look bright, but the thing is, they always are if Steve is nearby.

You open the door.

“I thought you were going to stay out there all day, staring in,” Sarah quips. “If it’s all the same to you, I’d like _both_ my sons here with me.”  
  
It’s not the first time she’s said that, but it might be the last, so your throat gets tight when you smile back at her. “Just thought...” you swallow. “Thought I’d give you two a while alone, ya know?”  
  
Sarah clicks her tongue, rolls her eyes, exasperated. “What a crock, Jamie,” she says. “Sit down.”

She doesn’t need to ask twice. You sit at the opposite edge of the bed, and she asks about your family, about what you’ve heard around the neighborhood or church, and it’s all mundane, but it breaks the ice. After that, the three of you talk and talk and talk, even when she gets tired, even when you and Steve get a little choked up.

“You look peaky, little love,” Sarah says to Steve, runs her hand up and down his arm. “Get some rest, both of you.”  
  
Steve goes grey. You try not to look at him, guts twisting into knots. “Ma, I can’t just—”  
  
“Do as I say for _once_ , Stiofán,” she says, smooths the stubborn bangs back from his eyes. “I’ll be all right. I promise.”

Then, she turns to you, eyes tired and serious. “Keep an eye on him for me, Jamie. Do that for me, please.”

You know what it means. You know exactly what she means, and you have to swallow around the lump in your throat twice before you give her a mock salute. “Yes, ma’am,” you say. “Always do.”

Then, her hands squeeze Steve’s and your own, tight as she can, and you squeeze back until she finally lets go, until Steve says, “Can you give us a second, Buck?”

You clasp his shoulder instead of answering, and you say, “Night, Ma,” before you step out. 

You keep your back to the door. You don’t want to butt in, in any way possible.

-

On the street, it’s dark and cold. February’s final, wet chill creeps back into your bones with newfound strength. You slide your arm around Steve’s shoulders out of habit, and you start a slow, slow trek to the subway station.

He doesn’t look at you. Doesn’t look at anything, really, and how can you blame him?

“Hey,” you say, and maybe you squeeze him a little closer. Whether it’s to keep the cold from getting to him or to let him know you’re still here, you’re not sure. “Mind if I stay over tonight? I don’t really feel like going back home.”

That’s not really true, but Steve will say no if he thinks you’re pitying him. You’re not. Not really, because you don’t feel so hot yourself, and you both could use the company, Steve moreso than anyone.

“Yeah,” Steve says, and his arm comes around your waist, tugging you closer together. You can’t even think about that now. Any other time, sure, but not now. “Yeah, why not?”  
  
-

You only go home to get cleaned up and pack a few things. You wash the smell and the feel of the hospital from your skin, and you barely say a word to Ma or Rebecca. But when Ma corners you in the living room to ask about Sarah, you shake your head and say—low enough for only her to hear, low enough that your voice goes hoarse—”Tehara, ili avertehara.” 

Her face falls. “Don’t say that,” she says, but she’s already pulling you in. “Don’t tell me that, chavo.”  
  
“Look, I gotta go,” you say in a rush, because if you stay any longer, if you hold on any longer, everything you’ve been trying to push down is going to come rising to the surface. “I told Steve I’d stay—”

“Jas palpale,” Ma tells you, still gripping your arms as she moves away. She jerks her head to the front door. “Mila, Jamie. Don’t leave him alone,”

You’re at Steve’s door in less than ten minutes.

The couch is already set up for you. A sheet and a blanket and a throw pillow, same as always. “Gee, you sure know how to make a guy feel welcome,” you say. “You got dinner waiting for me, too?”

“Do I look like your wife or something? Make your own damn dinner,” Steve says, but there’s a ghost of a smile on his lips. His eyes follow your hand into your coat pocket, as you pull out the deck of cards.  
  
“Poker or pinochle?” you ask.

-

You stay up for hours. Neither of you have much to do tomorrow, since it’s Saturday, and you take advantage of it, talking until the sky turns pink. Your cheeks hurt from laughing, and somehow, both of you managed that. Getting stuck in fits of it. A part of you feels like you haven’t had this in forever, but the other part is too focused on the way Steve’s nose scrunches up when he really laughs.

-

When you finally fall asleep, you dream about Sarah.

You dream of walking down Fulton Street, and she walks out of the movie house, her hair thick and healthy and combed back. Her arm is linked with a soldier’s, whose cap held in his free hand, blond hair floppy against his forehead. He’s tall and wiry, and he could be anyone, but you already know who he is by his smile and his big nose and the way his eyes crinkle when he smiles at her.

For whatever reason, you wave at them. They don’t notice you. Maybe Sarah sees you out of the corner of her eye, but you feel like you’re somewhere you don’t belong. Like you’re a puzzle piece that doesn’t quite fit in here.

-

The telegram comes in the afternoon.

You and Steve sit at the table for a long time. You aren’t sure how long. Time turns liquid and stretches to a point where you can’t make sense of it at all. Your eyes are blurry and searing hot, chest feeling thinner than an eggshell, like it might crack open and spill your guts all over the place. “Steve,” you croak.

Nothing. His eyes are dry and his jaw is set. You’re reminded of a back alley a few blocks away, of Tommy Corcoran’s fist slamming in Steve’s stomach, but this is different. You’re torn between waiting for him to fall apart, or bust you a good one.

“Stevie—”

“Go home,” he says without looking up, almost pleading. “Please, Buck, just go home.”  
  
You shake your head. “I don’t want to,” you say. “I can’t just leave, pal.”

“Well, I’m not asking you.” Steve’s throat bobs hard. “I’m telling you to. Maybe go tell your family what’s going on. They got a right to know.”

“I’ll tell them later,” you say, fingers itching to reach for him. “Just lemme stay here a while.”  
  
“Jesus, Bucky, I’m not some goddamn basket case!” His voice carries through the room and his fist slams into the tabletop hard enough to make you jump. He’s not looking at you. He’s not looking at anything, gaze burning a hole into the air. “I’m so _sick_ of—”

He buries his face in his hands, twists his fingers into his hair until his knuckles are white with it, elbows digging into the table. His body is tight like a rubberband, and one wrong move might make him snap.

You don’t care. You don’t care because when the hell have you ever just sat there and let him go through it alone?

You shove off of your chair and it rasps across the floor. “Shit. Fuck, c’mere,” you say with a voice lost in your throat, and come up behind him. “Just get over here, huh, Steve? Come here.”

You’re wrapping your arms tight around his shoulders, tucking his arms in, too. You squeeze him like you might be able to stop everything from falling apart, breathing in exhaustion and the lingering smell of the hospital, feeling his hair tickling against your face. It’s hard not to focus on it, since he’s overwhelming every sense you have.

“I don’t know what to do,” Steve is saying, voice lost in the crush of your arm, breath hot and wet against the sleeve of your shirt. “All I can think about—I can’t even afford it to give her a funeral. I can’t do it, I can’t give her _anything_ , Buck, after everything she’s done for me, and it ain’t fair. None of it’s fair.”  
  
“I know.” You have nothing else to offer him, you can only be here. “I know, pal, it’s...it’s the goddamn pits, is what it is.”

He’s shaking now, and your legs are giving out, so you hold on tighter, feel his hands grip hard onto your forearms. “It ain’t fair that it was her,” Steve continues. “It should’ve been me. If it were me, she’d still—”

That sets you off. That sets you on _fire_. 

“Shut up,” you bark, and come around to make him look at you, hands on either side of his head. Steve’s hands come to the crooks of your elbows. He’s red from the tips of his ears to his throat, eyes bloodshot and streaming. He’s tensed up like he’s angry. He’s not sad, he’s _pissed_ . “Don’t say that, you hear me? If it were you, I swear, your ma would pick a fight with God himself to get you back. Give him an eye or a leg or whatever he asked for, you know that. You can’t do this to yourself, pal, you’ll drive yourself _nuts_. You gotta—” your throat tightens, and the grief you’ve been choking back finally spews out, spills from your eyes. “You gotta do what she always tells you. Stand up, Steve. You gotta keep standing up. If you ain’t gonna do it for yourself, then do it for her.”

Steve’s eyes are on the floor, already too tired and too old for someone who hasn’t even turned eighteen yet. “What else am I supposed to do?” he says to no one in particular, and then asks you, “What am I supposed to do?”

There’s so much you can say. You can ask him to move in with you, you can ask to move in with _him_ , or say something meaningless, but you don’t.

You swallow down whatever ridiculous fucking fear you have and press your lips to his temple, firm and lingering, fingers threading tight in his hair. When you rest your forehead against his, you say, “We’ll figure it out,” and then you clear your throat. “We. _Us_. You and me, because I’m not going anywhere anytime soon.”

-

On the day of the burial, Ma lays out an old suit of your father’s, cleaned and pressed. She already gave you his coat last winter, because you were finally tall enough for it, and you’re about the same build as he was before he passed away. 

Sarah Rogers is buried beside her husband, and her burial brings a little crowd of people, most of them from church, some of her neighbors, but you don’t pay them any mind. You’re sat listening to a prayer you’re not so sure works anymore, and watching Steve sprinkle dirt into a hole in the ground.

As some sort of cruel joke, it’s sunny. It’s not warm at all. The air is cold and damp and miserable, but the sun is in your eyes during the entire burial.

It blinds you as Sarah’s casket is lowered into the ground, as the mourners file out, and when your eyes readjust and the clouds settle over the sky, Steve is gone.

“Fuck me,” you hiss. You’re not swatted at or anything, because you’re already running across dewy grass, but Steve is nowhere to be found.

Becca, all gangly limbs in her black dress, her curls breaking free of her bun, is running up to you. “Kajlo?” she asks, exasperated. Even at fourteen, you see how much she’s going to look like Ma, all sharp bones and olive skin and thick dark hair, all the same aside from her eyes, which are a mirror of yours. “I asked Father Hill, and he said he didn’t see him anywhere.”

You shrug, maybe a little helplessly, and she comes closer. She slings a skinny arm around your neck, and you pull her close, walking back toward the edge of the cemetery. “You okay, kid?” you ask.

Becca shrugs under the weight of your arm. “I just didn’t realize I was gonna miss her so bad. It’s like my brain still thinks she’ll be at mass this week, or at our place for dinner, or—”  
  
“I know what you mean.” If you squeeze her a little tighter, she doesn’t say a word. “You seen Ma anywhere?”  
  
She meets your eyes, then. “She’s visiting Pop. Should we go, too?” 

You weave your way through headstones and tombs together, until you find the spot. Until you find Ma standing at the grave, with a ramrod straight back. You think she might be saying something, but she stops the second she sees the two of you.

Usually, the three of you come by on his birthday and Christmas. Sometimes, Ma leaves food he liked or pours a slosh of scotch on the grass, says something in Romanes you can’t quite understand. Something you still can’t quite put together, as fluent in it as you are, but she says you won’t need to know what it means for a long time. If she dies, if you outlive whoever you marry, you suppose you’ll learn. You wonder who’ll be there to put you in the ground one day, to bring the food or drink you liked while you were alive.

You think about this for a long time. You think about the fact that you’re wearing a dead man’s clothes, and after Becca and Ma press their lips to the headstone, you do the same, and say, “See you later, Pop,” before the three of you file out.

You find Steve a while later, when you find the time to slip away.

-

When you try not to pour everything you feel out of you, when he tries to soldier through and say he can get by on his own, you say only half the things you want to say to him. It makes him look at you with the sun in his eyes, the same look some scrawny kid with a bloody nose gave you in an alley on Water Street, and you think that maybe, everything will end up being just fine.

-

At the end of the month, all of Steve’s belongings are tucked into a few marked boxes. He finally comes around for dinner, and stays for hours like he used to, but he doesn’t stay the night, even when Ma asks him to.

“You’re a tough nut to crack, Steve,” Ma tells him after he refuses for a third time, and shakes her head. “One stubborn sonofabitch.”  
  
He chokes on coffee that’s long gone cold when she says that, because Ma doesn’t cuss around anyone but you and Becca. “Oh, you think that’s funny?” Ma says, dark brows raised. “You think I don’t talk like you and Jamie? Where do you think he learned how to curse, dinlo?”  
  
He’s really laughing now, and so are you. “Jesus, Buck, there’s two of you,” he says. “Oh my God.”

-

After Steve leaves, after everything’s clean and you’re leaning out the fire escape, the burn of a cigarette in your lungs, you say, “I think I’m gonna find a place of my own.”  
  
Ma takes a drag of her own cigarette. “And you think you can find some place you two can afford?” she asks, points to you with her free hand. “Don’t look at me like that. I know exactly what you’re doing.”  
  
Strangely, you feel accused. Exposed. “What?” you blurt out.

“You don’t want Steve living alone,” she says. “I know you don’t, but answer one question for me.”

You just shrug, still feeling like you’re being cut open.

“Are you doing this because you have to or because you want to?”

You almost don’t want to answer, but you don’t have a choice. Ma can read you like a book, and you’d rather say it yourself than have it said for you. “Aside from you and Becks, he’s all I got,” you say simply as you tap the ashes off your cigarette, because it’s true. It ain’t no affront to God. It’s been rough, and even though people put up with you, even though some girls hang around you, people don’t like you once they figure you out. No one wants to be seen with you after that. No one except for Steve. “And now, I’m all he’s got.”

Ma looks at you, and not a single word passes between the two of you, but she looks at you and you think she knows. You think she’s got your number now.

She huffs out a cloud of smoke. “You and I are a lot alike, chavo,” she says, maybe a little plaintively. “Too much alike.”

-

That night in bed, you don’t sleep. Ma’s words are running through your head over and over again. She always said you were like your pop, but you never felt that was true aside from looking like him, and you think she didn’t quite believe it, either.

Because the truth is, it’s you and her who are just alike. Stubborn and proud, and a sucker for idiots with blue eyes.

-

“You know,” you say, lying on the bare floor of the Rogerses apartment. “I found a place in the paper.”

“Yeah?” Steve is absorbed in his sketchbook, barely looking your way.

“Yuh-huh. Twenty-five dollars per month,” you say, try to remain nonchalant, even though you ripped the ad out of the paper three days ago, have been saving it ever since. “It ain’t a mansion, but I’ve been holding onto it, just in case.”  
  
Steve stops, then. He sighs, leans back heavily in his chair. “I don’t think I can afford it,” he says. “Thanks for looking, but I think I’ll just have to rent a room from someone.”  
  
You pull yourself up to sit. “Well, what if you weren’t paying the whole rent?”  
  
Steve’s brows draw together, and then he shuts his eyes. “Buck, the last thing I’m letting you do is pay for anything,” he argues. “You’ve done enough for me as it is, and I’m grateful for it, but I can’t take your money.”  
  
“You think I don’t know that?” you ask, and stand up, grab the scrap of paper from your pocket, thrust it at him. “I ain’t offering you money, you dope, I’m offering you _me_ . We split the rent, and we’ll be able to afford it. I work, you work, we’ll get by just fine.”  
  
For maybe the first time ever, Steve doesn’t seem to know how to respond. “But,” he stammers, brows knitting together. “Wait. What about your Ma? What about Becca? What are they gonna think about you movin’ out?”  
  
“One less mouth to feed,” you say with a shrug. “I’ll see ‘em all the time, no doubt about that. We ain’t moving to Texas, Steve, it’s just Red Hook. Two rooms, heating, and—look, don’t think of it like charity, because it’s _not_. If I’m gonna live with anyone, I’d wanna live with you.”

To your surprise, Steve huffs a laugh. He sets his charcoal down, fingers stained with it, jaw smudged with it, and takes the paper from you, eyes skating over it for half a second before he finds your gaze. “You know, when we were kids, I used to ask Ma all the time why you couldn’t just live with us,” he says. “Or why I couldn’t live with you, and just...I dunno, hide under your bed or something.”  
  
“Yeah, well,” you say, something foolish and hopeful swelling in your chest. “You’re not alone there.”  
  
“Just promise me one thing,” Steve says.  
  
_Anything_ , you almost say. “Lay it on me.”

“You better not snore on me.”

You both look at each other for a few seconds that feel endless, and when he grins at you, you feel yourself do the same. You allow relief to wash over you in waves. “We’ll get your stuff later,” you say, already making your way to the door. “By this time tomorrow, you’ll have somewhere to put it!”

-

Your new home is a tenement on Van Brunt Street, not far from the shipyards. Close to a deli, a bakery, plenty of businesses, and you’re right on top of a retailer that’s long since shut down.

The apartment is a shoebox, but what the hell do either of you care? The radiator creaks and stinks a little, but it gives off heat, as promised. There’s a kitchen, and there are two bed frames in the back. You bring your mattress from home, and Steve does the same. There’s a bathtub in the kitchen, a ply board to cover it up when you’re not using it, and Ma gives you an old table linen for it. And boom, you have somewhere to eat and somewhere to sit.

“If you live like pigs, I’ll knock your heads together,” Ma says as she carries the last box, a few knick knacks and other things you didn’t want to leave at home, up the stairs. “Sarah and I taught you better than that.”

You huff. “Jesus, we _won’t_ , Ma, and I can carry my own damn—“

“It’s not heavy. Don’t worry about it.”  
  
“I know, but just let me—”

“Oi devel, can’t you let your mother do one more thing for you?” Ma snaps, then, at the top of the stairs, she locks her eyes on you. “You sure you’re ready to do this?”

You shrug. “Woulda had to do it eventually,” you say, and take the box from her, slip it under your arm, and put your free one around her shoulder. “Why? You gonna miss me or something?”

“I’d miss you if you moved next door, Jamie,” Ma says, and she rubs your back in a circle. Your chest twinges a little. “I have you under my roof for almost nineteen years and now you’re going out on your own.”

“I would have had to do it eventually,” you repeat, nudging the ajar door further open. “Everyone does. You did too.”

She tsks at that. “That’s different, dinlo,” she says. “I’ll tell you the whole story one of these days.”

Well, if that’s not a change. The past was one of the very few subjects Ma refused to talk about. If it were a few years ago, she would have clammed up completely.

“What story’s that?” Steve calls from the back room.  
  
“The story of why Ma hates you,” you shoot back, and set the box down on the floor. “She told me everything just now.”  
  
“Ha-ha.” Steve’s coming out from the back, dust on his nose, big feet clomping on the floor. You have a funny feeling the neighbors are going to hate you both. Steve and his stomping, his butter fingers dropping things all day. You and your loud voice, but you can’t really help that. It’s just the way you talk. “Real funny, Buck. Anyone ever tell you you should be in the pictures?”

“Patty Merrell used to tell me I look like Clark Gable all the time,” you say, leaning against the wall. It’s cold, and the radiator is banging in a steady rhythm, giving the little rat trap of a place something like heat. “Maybe I’ll hitch a ride to Hollywood and give that a try instead of hanging around this dump. And you can come too! We’ll throw a wig on you and tell everybody you’re Mae West.”

That earns you a flick in the temple from Ma, and a _dosta, Jamie._ “Your friend’s running his mouth, chavo,” she says to Steve. “You know you’re ours.”

Steve laughs it off, laughs both of you off, but you can see the flush creep up his neck. Everything’s still raw, of course. You haven’t asked if he’s doing alright, because you know he won’t answer you truthfully. “I know, Win,” he says. “I know.”  
  
She reaches up to ruffle your hair, and then she kisses Steve on the cheek, slings an arm around his neck when he wrinkles his nose, leaving them cheek to cheek. He squeezes back even though he’s not much of a hugger. Never was, but you think he’s gotten used to the Barneses bad habit. Or maybe it’s a Samuel thing. You aren’t sure.  
  


“Let me get out of your hair,” Ma says, and tugs her scarf a little tighter around her neck before she moves for the door. “I want both of you in my house after Sunday mass. Got it?”

When she leaves, slams the door behind her (another bad Barnes habit), you turn to Steve, who’s staring a hole through you. He’s doing that a lot lately, and it makes you nervous, makes you want to ask if something’s the matter. “So,” you say instead. “Are we gonna keep sitting here like a couple of mooks or are we gonna finish this?”

-

Living with Steve’s easier than breathing, but it’s also _living with Steve_ , which is in turn a nightmare. You two hang around all night, talking and laughing. You get in fights like an old married couple over nothing, and he can keep it going for _hours_ if he wants to, until you both go steely and he’ll finally say something like, “Want something from the store?” and you’ll say, “I’ll just walk with you.” 

Everything usually ends up just fine after that.

You learn that Steve has become a night owl, too, and the hours you spend awake aren’t so lonely. He stays up all night working on commissions, smelling up the apartment with paint and his turpentine while you mend your clothes, or polish your one good pair of dress shoes, or read _War of The Worlds_ until you can’t see straight. You two don’t talk much during that time, because you both like having some quiet once in a while, but it’s nice knowing he’s there. Nice hearing him say goodnight when you’re both finally in the dark, watching the rise and fall of his shoulders while you drift off.

Steve’s commissions come in a little more steadily once people around the city start giving him some attention, once they stop shooing him out of their offices and actually look at his portfolio. You find yourself at the docks, working till the sun sets and your bones ache and you come back with your pay in hand, shoving half into your wallet, and the other half in the empty coffee can. Same as Steve does. You aren’t sure what you’re saving for, but it feels like you’re doing something worthwhile.

Right now, the clock reads midnight, and you’re both still somewhat awake, a little relieved that the cold is finally beginning to break as March rolls on, even though spring means Steve might get hay fever, means his asthma might get worse.

You’re reading _The Time Machine_ but you’re just tired enough to be unable to focus on a single word, rereading the same passage over and over, so you’ve given that up. Now, your eyes are drilling into something in the far corner, fighting to stay awake, socked feet propped up on the sofa. 

Someone flicks you between your eyes. You wrinkle your nose. “Hey,” Steve says from above you, and he looks a little too happy. “Happy birthday.”

“Oh,” you say dimly and sit up. “Yeah. Thanks.”

You can already see by his face he’s got something to say and _goddamn it,_ he better not have—

“I didn’t get you anything last year,” Steve says. Yeah, no shit, he didn’t get anything last year, because Steve was paying bills and working full-time, and what kind of jerk would you be if you expected anything from him? If you wanted anything at all? “But I wanted to make up for it.”  
  
“I swear to God, Rogers, if it’s anything expensive,” you start,  
  
“Just shut up and take the present, Buck,” Steve says. He holds the box in front of you. It’s small. That’s a bad sign. “I’m not missing the rent or grabbing out of the coffee can, so don’t worry about it.”

You stifle a groan, open the box, and your mouth goes dry.

It’s the pocket watch from Williamsburg.

“Steve, how did you…” You whip your head up to look at him, struck dumb. “When did you get this?”

“A while ago, been putting what I could toward it,” he says, and when you look up, he looks pleased as punch. He jerks his head to the watch. “Turn it over.”  
  
You turn it over. It’s engraved because _of fucking course it is_ , engraved with your initials. _J.B.B._ , scratched into silver. You feel a little sick. 

Scratch that. You feel _very_ sick.  
  
God, if you sold it, you’d both be set for a long while. You won’t have to worry about the rent, or groceries, or Steve getting the medicine he needs. Ma’s words are echoing through your head, telling you life isn’t about having things, but—

This is yours. Not handed down, not something you had to save up for. Not bought at the secondhand shop, something shiny and new and all _yours._

“I,” you start. and think of saying, _I can’t take this_ or _you shouldn’t have done that_ or _don’t throw your money around for me anymore_ , but you don’t say any of it, because you can’t bear to wipe that look off Steve’s face. He hasn’t looked this light since before Sarah got sick. You swallow hard, run your thumb over the engravings, and look up at him. “Thanks. Thank you, Stevie. Honest. I love it. I’m just…”

 _Devel,_ you think. _I’m in for it. I’m fucking in for it._

A skinny arm comes around your shoulders, so you bring your free hand up to Steve’s back, trace the knobs of his spine beneath your fingertips before you can stop yourself, as he says, soft, “Happy birthday, Buck.”

-

Ma makes dinner and Becca bakes you a chocolate cake, all melting frosting with jimmies haphazardly piled on the sides of it. It’s sweet and soft and is sent home with you, so you live off of cake for breakfast for a few days after, and you’d be an idiot if you complained about that.

You don’t tell anyone about the watch. Fellas didn’t just go around buying each other goddamn jewelry, especially when they weren’t doing so well with money. Maybe if you were a dame or Steve was a dame, it wouldn’t matter.

If that was the case, everything would be different.

-

The rest of March is a haze, and April creeps up fast. 

You spend Easter with Ma, Rebecca, and Steve, because you’re all the four of you have. There’s mass and hours spent in the yard behind St. Joseph’s, because of the potluck. There’s more food than usual, since it’s a holiday. Colcannon and easter bread and casseroles, stews and trays of pasta, cabbage rolls and a big loaf of bread you helped Ma with, a cake that Rebecca made, and baklava from the Dukases who live in Prospect Heights, which is probably the best damn thing you’ve ever tasted. Leaves your fingers and mouth sticky with honey and nuts.  
  
“Dosta,” Ma says, when you go for a third piece. “Gluttony’s a sin, Yasha.”  
  
“You just want it all for yourself,” you say, and then she takes the piece you set down. “See what I mean!”  
  
There’s a lot of chatter throughout the day. Everyone feels like they haven’t seen each other in forever, even though it’s only been less than a week. It dies down halfway through the evening, once the weight of the day settles in. You glance at Steve, who seems all right.

You’re about to say something stupid, say you’re glad Steve doesn’t have to spend Easter alone, because he’s got you three, but Rebecca looks up from her plate, still stabbing at the remains of her cabbage roll when she says, “I’m going steady with Scott Proctor.”  
  
You and Steve burst out, at the same time, “ _Who?”_

-

Scott Proctor is a goddamn idiot. A lanky, stupid idiot with copper hair and freckles and a sheepish smile. He’s the type of guy that says, _aw jeez_ and _aw shucks_ , and turns red from the tips of his ears whenever you look less than happy with him.

But, whenever your baby sister talks, his face lights up like a Christmas tree. It’s all just puppy love, you know that. They’re decent enough kids to have that, and you’re decent enough not to tell Becca as much, but you _do_ sling an arm around Scott’s neck and say _I see one single tear on her face because of you and you’re dead meat, Scottie-boy_ when you walk him outside. He turns grey, but he nods, and you think he gets the picture

-

Soon enough, Becks begs you to go on a double date with them. 

Of course, you agree, and you immediately walk around the corner from your place and ask Theresa Maltese to come with the three of you to Coney Island. Then, you ask her to bring her little sister, Frannie, along, since you’ve got a perfectly good pal who could use a date right about now.

In the end, it’s too many people. You and Terri, Steve and Frannie, Rebecca and Scott. It’s a gaggle of noise. Two Italian girls and _Rebecca_ , for crying out loud. Their voices could trigger a goddamn earthquake. 

Rebecca and Scott are the youngest of your group. Fourteen and fifteen, respectively, so it ends up feeling more like a babysitting job than a date, because if you catch Proctor trying anything funny, he’s got another one coming to him. 

Still, you and Terri have a ball. She thinks it’s sweet that you look out for your sister, and she thinks Frannie really likes Steve. Frannie’s nice enough, too, and you think she and Steve get along real well. She has dark hair half-pinned up, and a loud laugh. She’s rough and runs across the boardwalk, drags Steve by the hands toward the ferris wheel with a contagious grin.

You try not to think too much of it, but you feel a little twist of envy when Steve smiles back at her. When he follows her down the boardwalk without looking back.

Another deadly sin. Two out of seven crossed out so far.

“Say, Buck,” Terri says after she loses a game of ring toss, arms wrapped around your bicep, leaning in close. “You wanna go on the beach?”

It’s late enough that the beach is empty. She wants some alone-time, and you know what alone-time might lead to. You feel a little green in the gills, if you’re being honest. 

“Well,” you start, try not to swallow. Try not to let her see that you’re nervous. “You ever been on the beach before?”  
  
Terri smiles at you, a wicked thing pulling at her mauve painted lips. “Only been near it,” she says. “But I’ll go if you go.”

-

You and Terri go on the beach. 

She takes her shoes off and you do the same, holding them in your hand as you follow her across the sand, spongey beneath your toes. You feel dizzy, almost drunk, and nothing’s even happened yet.

But, you choke down your worry and tug her under the boardwalk, hidden away from anyone who might see the two of you. It’s colder and darker here. You can feel the footsteps of everyone above you, and you start wondering where Steve and Becca and their dates are, but Terri’s eyes are drinking you in and she’s tugging you closer, fingers twisted in your collar, and then you stop thinking completely.

You kiss her slow and sweet, taste lemonade and lipstick and cigarettes on her, and when you stick your tongue into her mouth, she makes a sound that goes right through you and that’s _it_. You tug her panties down and put a hand between her legs. You’ve never done this before. You’re only doing what you’ve overheard, what the guys at the docks have said they’ve done, and you let her guide you where she wants for a while, and then you’re hard as a rock. You can smell Terri and the ocean and food wafting from the boardwalk. You can smell your own sweat and feel your heart skittering in your chest.

When you finally hitch her dress up, press her up against a post, and bury yourself in, the crash of waves drowns out the sounds the two of you make. You finish on her legs with your mouth pressed to her neck and her fingers twisting in your hair and Terri giggling, half to herself, “Jesus Roosevelt _Christ_ , Barnes.”

You laugh too, and you think that maybe you weren’t lying to yourself about girls after all. Maybe they’ll really help now, and you’ll forget all about the nutty things buzzing in your head.

-

Four days later, you haven’t heard from Terri, but on the subway back from Coney Island, you promised to stop by on Saturday to take her to the pictures.

Four days later, you come home stinking of the docks and find Steve necking with Frannie in the kitchen, and you go so red you get a head rush. 

“Oh,” you croak when they both whip around to gape at you like you’re a copper shining a flashlight in their eyes. “Sorry, I was just—I’ll leave you to it.”  
  
And you’re out like a shot, sick to your stomach because being around girls was supposed to _fix_ you. You’re supposed to feel better, or different, or thinking about Terri when you jerk yourself off, but you don’t. 

God help you, you _don’t._

The thought makes you want to speed to St. Joseph’s, to spew out all your poison in confession, but you think better of it. Too many people know you, and you aren’t too sure you pay much attention in church anymore anyway. Now that you think about it, the last time you sat in a pew was Easter Sunday. 

You shove that all away and go to Burton’s instead. You buy a fresh pack of Lucky Strikes and a bottle of grape Nehi, and sit your ass on the porch of a tenement that closed down a few months back. The smoke sits heavy in your lungs, and the soda is too sweet on your tongue. Sticky on your teeth.

Suddenly, you’re aware of every little thing around you. The grime on your skin. The rotten fish smell on your hands. The guilt simmering in your gut. You feel watched. You feel wrong and ugly and _sick_.

-

Frannie comes over one more time, and then stops completely. You don’t ask why, and Steve doesn’t tell you anything about it.

-

You take Terri out a few times, since there’s no privacy for anything else and you don’t have time to be around her, and on top of that, Frannie gets all jumpy when you come by. Then, their father loses his job at the bank, so the Malteses pack up and move to goddamn Cherry Hill, New Jersey. Of all places to move.

 _It was nice while it lasted_ , you think when she kisses you goodbye. Maybe you had a chance with Terri. Maybe Steve had a chance with Frannie, but it doesn’t seem like the two of you are allowed to have much aside from each other.

-

You suppose you and Steve can call it even when he comes in from the greengrocer’s to find you pressed back against the wall with Virginia Wilson’s mouth wrapped around your dick. He turns beet red and is out like a bat from hell.

-

As time goes on, you’re beginning to learn that you don’t like summer too much. You always feel restless and tight and too big for your skin, and the height of the season always seems to be the worst, always seems to go pear shaped somehow. 

While working, you get sunburned so badly you blister and can barely move off the sofa. You have to take two days off for the pain, because your entire torso aches and smarts with every breath. Steve pours ice on your back, and you pretend you’re not grateful for his careful touches, his cold fingertips on your fever-hot skin leaving you shivering for a whole different reason.

You don’t have enough money to get him anything for his 18th, and you feel like the biggest sack of shit in the whole state of New York just thinking about it. You’ll have to make it up to him for Christmas. It ain’t fair, him spending all of that money on you. He always rolls his eyes when you say that. says, _“I did it ‘cause I wanted to, Buck, so quit talking about it.”_

You’re nut brown by August, your forehead and the tip of you nose peeling, and when you finally get paid, you take the opportunity to sit your ass down on the boardwalk, breathing in salt and smoke.

“Good to have you back, Jim,” Andy O’Reilly says, and lights your cigarette for you, even though you have a perfectly good pack of matches. He always makes an effort to talk to you, and you don’t get why. He says good morning and goodnight and shoots the breeze with you, and even though the other guys do the same, Andy actually pretends to give a shit.

He’s a handsome guy. He’s your age, but his body is wiry and strong. He has red hair so dark it almost looks brown, a sharp, thin face, a bumpy nose that looks like it might have been broken before.

“Didn’t miss smelling the fish, I’ll tell you that,” you say, and try not to watch the way Andy’s cheeks hollow out when he takes a drag of his cigarette. “Ya smell like a sardine, O’Reilly, anyone ever tell you that?”

Andy laughs at that, a loud _ha!_ “Because you smell like a damn rose garden, Barnes.”

You grin around your cigarette. “And don’t you forget it.”  
  
You shut your eyes when a breeze comes off the water, breathe it in deep despite the stench, and you think you feel Andy’s eyes on you, but that’s probably not happening at all. You’re too jumpy lately. Around everyone.

“You know something,” Andy says, all quiet. You open your eyes, and yep, he’s staring a hole through you.

You nearly choke on your smoke, but you manage to say, “What’s that, O’Reilly?” 

It comes out strangled and quiet. Something in you is saying to bolt. Run for the hills. Maybe Andy can smell it off of you. Maybe he wants to rat you out to the foreman, and you don’t even know what he’d rat you out about. What would he say? You stole something of his? Tried to cop a feel? God, your brain is racing a mile a—

Andy leans forward and kisses you.

His lips are warm and dry, tasting salty like sweat but your body lights up with it. You don’t quite kiss back, and your eyes stay open but you do melt into it. Just a little, a needy sound coming from your mouth. Get lost in the feel of the callous on Andy’s thumb coming up to the dimple in your chin. He has rough stubble on his face, and it brushes yours, pulls a desperate noise from your throat just as he breaks away with a soft pop of your mouths.

“I,” you start hoarsely. Your throat is dry, guts churning. You lick your lips instead of finishing, his eyes follow the path of your tongue, and you clench your jaw tight. His hand is still on your chin. You don’t jerk away. You should. “I gotta get back.”

Andy knits his brows together, like he doesn’t quite believe you. Maybe he doesn’t. “Get back where?”  
  
“Home,” you say, head still feeling scrambled. You shake your head. “I mean, Steve’s probably already—”  
  
Andy deflates a little there, and his hand falls. “Oh. Jeez, Barnes, I’m sorry. I didn’t know you had a fella,” he says, then chuckles. “But I guess, why would I?”

“What?” you burst out. “No! No, Steve’s not—Steve ain’t like—” _Like what?_ You think. _Like Andy? Like you?_ “Steve ain’t like that. He’s my friend. That’s all.”  
  
“So, Steve ain’t like that, but you are?” Andy asks.  
  
“I don’t know,” you say quickly. Too quickly, and then something in you _snaps_. You shove up from your spot, feeling shaky from head to toe. You point at him with your free hand. “What business is it of yours, anyway, huh? You think I’m gonna spill my guts to you, O’Reilly? Well, I’m not, so keep dreaming. Keep fucking dreaming.”

Your voice cracks at the end. Your chest heaves.

“Jesus,” Andy hisses. “Keep your voice down.”  
  
“Fuck you,” you spit, blood pounding in your ears, face hot. “Stay the hell away from me.”

-

You slam the door when you walk in. You wish you had something to drink, or wish you cared less about the apartment or being kicked out, because you’re so angry you could drive your fist straight through the wall.

But that’s not you. You know that’s not you. You’re not an angry person. You don’t seethe at the world or think about coming at anyone with your fists because they looked at you funny, but now you are. You think should have knocked Andy out for what he did. Should have beat him bloody for even—

You breathe out through your nose, rub your filthy hands over your face.

This is bad. It’s real fucking bad, because maybe everyone from Brooklyn Heights to Red Hook knew that George Barnes’ widow and her brats were Roma, but now you had a new secret. Now, they’d call you a queer, too. Now, the guys from the docks might have a real reason to pound your face into hamburger, and no one could tell them they were wrong for it.

“Bucky?” There’s Steve. His heavy footsteps moving closer, moving toward you.

The back of your head hits the door with a heavy thunk, and you shut your eyes tight. You’re about to do it again, but your head is spinning a little, and Steve is in front of you saying, “Jesus, what the hell happened to you?”

You wonder what you look like. White as a sheet and shaky all over. Slamming your head in the goddamn walls. “Oh, not much,” you say lightly, and it sounds distant even to your ears.

Steve huffs. “Don’t bullshit me, Buck,” he says. “What happened?”

His hand is cool at the back of your neck when he makes you look him in the eye, and if that doesn’t make you feel worse than you already do. You’re choked up with it, but you don’t push him off.

“I said nothin’,” you grit out, and clench your fists until your nails dig into the flesh of your palms. “I feel fine, so just let it go.”

“ _Don’t_ bullshit me,” Steve repeats, and sure, he sounds pissed, but you can see the flash of worry in his eyes. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”  
  
“Nothing _happened_ ,” you insist, and shove away from him to get to the bedroom, innards twisting with the loss of touch. “Just leave it be for once, Steve. Leave me alone.”

You snatch the wireless off the kitchen counter, and you feel Steve’s eyes on you when he shouts your name, says _oh come on_ , and then, “Well, if that’s how you wanna be!”

“That’s how I wanna be!” you shout.

“Fine!”

“ _Fine_!” 

You shut the door. Rest your head against it. You hear Steve curse, but you switch the radio on, turn it louder and set it on the floor. You think your heart might stop with how fast it’s beating, and the Dodgers game does nothing to drown out your thoughts, drown out the toxic sludge of anger and fear and whatever other horrible things are trying to claw their way out of you.

If Steve hears the wet hitch of your breath through the door, over the music, he never mentions it. Maybe he does hear you, though, because he doesn’t hold as much of a grudge against you snapping at him the next day, and doesn’t bicker so much.

It does nothing to ease your nerves.

-

Andy does stay away from you the next day. And the day after that. Maybe he’s afraid you’ll rat him out or make a big stink about it, but you wouldn’t do that. You don’t want to see Andy bruised up and broken, because that’s exactly what he’ll be if anyone figures him out.

You just want him to keep away, that’s all. You want him to stop bringing everything you’ve tried to swallow down back up to the surface, rising up your throat like vomit.

-

A few of the guys ask if you want to have a drink somewhere. You say yes. Steve is at work anyhow, so you, Don, Arthur, Hal, and goddamn _Tommy Corcoran_ of all people, go to a bar.

“Well, wouldn’t ya know it!” he shouts when he first sees you, and puts his arm around you with a grin. “Bucky Barnes, we meet again!”

“Maybe we can keep it clean this time,” you say, slap him on the back. “Considering we ain’t in grade school anymore.”

-

“Barnes here beat the shit out of me when we were kids. I mean, I was a jerk, I was lookin’ for it, but jeez, you were a dirty fighter, bud. Came at me like a damn _bull_.” Tommy, who isn’t that bad now that he’s not a pissy nine year old, says. You’re taller than him now. He takes a swig of his beer. “You still fighting? Boxing or something? You should come down to Goldie’s. You’d love it.”

It’s not a bad idea, honestly, but the way Tommy talking your ear off isn’t really how you want to spend your days from here on out.

Tommy looks over your shoulder, cups a hand over his mouth, and grins wider. “Hey-o! Over here, O’Reilly! Get your ass on this stool!”

Andy plops in the seat across from you. Claps you on the shoulder, just like he does everyone else. “Hey, Jim,” he says lightly, like nothing ever happened.

You thought tonight couldn’t get any worse. Turns out you were wrong.

-

You drink until your legs can barely hold you up, and by last call, you’re sandwiched between Don and Andy, feet dragging as they walk you back to your building. “That’s my stop here, fellas,” Don says, a little slurred. “Missus’ll kill me if I stay out any later.”

“Give her a kiss for me, Donnie! And I mean a _real_ one!” you shout, and cackle when he tells you to shut your mouth, when he immediately starts bickering with Mrs. Don Whatever-the-hell-his-last-name-is

And then it’s you and Andy again. You say, before you can stop it, “I’m real sorry ‘bout last time.”  
  
“Water under the bridge, Jimmy,” Andy says without looking at you, face close and a little sweaty with the cloying heat that’s trailed into the night. “Don’t worry about it. I get it.”

“ _Bucky_ ,” you say, leaning into him a little more than before. Your eyes shut for a few seconds and you sigh. “‘S Bucky. No one ever fuckin’ calls me Jimmy, pal. No one.”  
  
“Bucky it is, then.” Andy’s hand is warm and tight on your side, and it leaves your stomach turning to liquid fire. “Isn’t that your place over there, Bucky?”  
  
You look up, and sure enough, it is. “My uh,” you start. “Roommate. He ain’t home yet. If you wanna come in.”

“That’s okay. I’ll just walk you up,” Andy says, maybe a little apologetically. You aren’t sure if you’re disappointed or not. He’s drunk, too, but he’s got some Irish blood in him, so he holds it a little better than you can. Still, you can see it in the glaze of his eyes, the red in his cheeks, the spit-wet curve of his lps.

Up the stairs you go, relieved to have someone there, someone to make sure you don’t fall back down and break your neck. You fish your keys from your pocket, struggle with it before you stumble into the empty living room. “Honey, I’m ho-ome!” you shout to no one, and Andy laughs at that.

“Idiot,” Andy says, smile light and easy, crinkling at the corners of his eyes. 

You grab him by his suspenders, tugging him inside and murmuring, “You’re the fuckin’ idiot.” right before you kiss him, hard enough to bruise, and he makes a muffled sound of surprise but then he’s kissing back, wiry arms wrapping around your back and tugging you closer. 

“I feel like I’m goin’ nuts,” you babble when you break away. “Keep thinking about—”  
  
“Me too.” Andy’s breath is hot, tasting of beer. “God, me too.”

-

You don’t want to mess up the bed or the couch, so you turn the wireless loud to drown out any noise, and do it on the floor, the drunken weight of Andy’s body on top of yours, and his calloused hand on your dick. When you come—embarrassingly fast—, you bite into the meat of his shoulder to stop yourself from shouting, tasting warm skin on your tongue.

“I wanna do somethin’ for you,” you slur, even though you feel a little in over your head, when you flip him over, hoping the Gillespies don’t hear the thump of his body. Andy’s eyes are blown black, a soft green ring remaining, and his smirk is dazed, soft around the edges. You reach down, scratching at coarse red hair before you take him in your hand.

When you fit your mouth over him, when you lick a slow stripe up the length of his dick just like Virginia used to do for you, he sucks air in through his teeth and moans out, “Oh, _fuck_ ,” as he twists his fingers into your hair.

It isn’t much longer before Andy goes over the edge with a muffled yelp, blocked by his fist, and when he gets up on shaky legs, he just swallows thickly, stuffs himself back into his pants. “Guess I’ll see you around?” he asks, and sounds dazed with it.

“Yeah,” you say, throat sore. “Yeah, you bet.”

You walk him out, and shut the door behind him, something like guilt digging its claws into you.

Even when you brush your teeth and clean yourself up, you taste Andy in the back of your throat. It shouldn’t drive you wild, shouldn’t get you going all over again, but you get off to the thought of Andy later on, of doing even more than you did tonight, You wonder if you’d _let him_ do more. If you’d let him put his mouth on your dick or if you’d let him press you face down on the bed and—

You come for the second time that night, while Steve sleeps in the bed across from yours, and you’re trying not to look at him, trying not to make a single sound when your thoughts shift from Andy to Steve. 

It’s even harder than before.

-

Andy is good company. If Steve isn’t around, he comes upstairs for a beer or a cup of coffee, and you neck until you can’t breathe. You’ll suck him off while he sits on the couch or he’ll get his hand down your shorts and jerk you off against the wall, until your release hits you like a speeding train, until your legs turn to mush beneath you.

One night, Steve is gone for hours, and you don’t even think about where he might be, because Andy says he wants to try something new. He lies you back on your bed and then he slips Vaseline-slick fingers into you, one by one before he replaces it with his dick. It doesn’t hurt. You’ve heard it might, but it doesn’t. It feels incredible, and you bite down on your lip to stop yourself from crying out with every snap of Andy’s hips, to the point that you taste blood in your mouth.

Next time, you do it to him, and he moans and curses, clenches around you, and you think this feels just as good, maybe even better.

-

“We can’t do this anymore,” you say a few nights later, surprising yourself. “We’re gonna get caught.”  
  
“You could come to my place from now on,” Andy says simply, shrugs. “It’s in Fort Greene. No roommates.”

It leaves want burning hot in your gut, but it feels too official. It could end up _meaning something_ and, frankly, you don’t want anything like that with him. Sure, you liked the way his body pressed against yours, the way he rutted his hips against yours, and maybe you’d like to feel it again, but it’ll never go further than that.

“I like girls too, you know,” you say. “I’m not all queer.”

Andy rolls his eyes. “Yeah, I know, you made that pretty obvious,” he says. “But that’s not what this is about, is it?”

He’s saying it without saying it at all. Andy’s seen Steve, just waved when he stopped by the docks a couple days ago, but he must have seen you a hell of a lot clearer once he did. “No,” you say, voice all strangled. “I guess not.”  
  
“Look, Bucky,” Andy says, and he looks at you with pity in his eyes. “If Steve’s not like you and me, don’t get lost in this, huh? It’ll eat you alive. Swallow you whole.”  
  
_It already has_ , you think. “I ain’t stupid, O’Reilly,” you say. “Don’t worry about it.”

-

  
You and Andy don’t hang around much after that. 

You invite him for a beer, and he declines. After that, You notice him hanging around Hal instead, getting on better with him than he did with you, and you feel a little envious, but you keep your feelings to yourself, and work around your usual crowd instead, shooting the breeze with Arthur and Don as you work until you ache, a familiar, steadying feeling.

The sky crackles with the promise of a summer storm as you finish for the day, fat raindrops falling on your head while you walk home, wages in your pocket, relishing in the cooling air.

It rains all evening, and by the time eight o’clock comes around, Steve still isn’t back from the grocer’s, meaning he’s going around with his portfolio again, _goddamn idiot._

It’s not all bad, though. Not really. It means you have the place to yourself for a little while. You run a bath and scrub the grime and sweat from your skin, muscles loosening, little by little, even with the chill of the water. 

By the time you’re dressed, sat at the dinner makeshift table on your third round of solitaire and some of that weight lifted from your shoulders, Steve unlocks the door, soaked to the bone. 

You immediately turn around and say, “Hey, there’s this crazy new invention called an umbrella. You ever heard of it?”

“You ever hear of shutting your trap?” Steve puts his soaking hat on the hook, digs his portfolio from under his shirt, and drops it on the table. “I missed the train, had to wait for a taxi, never got one, so I just walked back, which was a goddamn—”  
  
He coughs into his sleeve, wet and thick. You throw down your jack of clubs and think _shit_.

“That’s what you get for walking in the rain, pal,” you say nonchalantly, and stand up, step closer. “That been going on all day?”  
  
Steve’s eyes are watering with the force of another cough, and you clench your jaw tight. He shakes his head as he strips down to his undershirt. “Had to clean out the stockroom,” he croaks. “Dusty as hell, lifting boxes all damn day. Lemme just get—”  
  
“I got this,” you say, and come to grab his wet clothes, unable to shake the seed of worry trying to grow in the pit of your stomach. “Just go put on something dry, huh? The longer you stay like that, the worse you’re gonna feel.”

“I _got it_ , Buck,” he says irritably, swallows too hard. His wet hair drips down his nose. He shoves it out of his eyes.

“Sure,” you huff, and don’t say much else. Not even when his breath starts getting wheezy. “Whatever you say.”

-

It’s just a cough, but it doesn’t go away, and it ain’t fair, because this whole time, Steve has been _fine_ . His lungs have acted up a bit, but it was nothing his meds couldn’t fix. No pain in his joints, no fevers, he hasn’t even gotten into any fights. No bloody noses or bruises lately, and if _that_ wasn’t a blessing in disguise, a little stroke of luck you both have been needing.

You have a funny that luck is running dry, because Steve has to take a week off work and you have to work overtime because of it. 

Even with your extra pay, you nearly miss the rent.

-

Steve gets better, and gets back to work soon enough, but the cough refuses to go away.

“It’s that goddamn paint, I tell you,” you say through a mouthful of pastrami, pointing a finger in Steve’s face. It’s late, another long day, but more money in your pocket because of it. You haven’t even had the chance to bathe yet, since you caught Steve on the corner and walked with him to the deli. “All the fumes are goin’ straight to your lungs. Makin’ you sick.”  
  
“Your Ma ever tell you to chew with your mouth closed, Barnes?” Steve says, mouth curled up with disgust. “Jesus.”  
  
“Quit avoiding, Rogers,” you press, swallow your food, because, well, _yeah she just might have_. “Point is, maybe you need to take a couple days off commissions. You’ve still got Seville’s. Lay off on that sign for a couple days, and stick with the other gig, I’m sure that creep’ll pay you extra if you pick up the pace on those dirty comics.”  
  
“Shh!” Steve says, and you can’t help snorting a laugh when he turns red from his ears to his chin. “Don’t need the whole damn deli knowing about that.”

Steve drawing for eight-pagers is a new development, but it’s a paying one, enough to leave you both a little less worried about the rent now that he’s got this gig and the greengrocer. You don’t feel so much like the breadwinner of the house anymore. Not that you would have cared either way.

Besides, helping Steve come up with lines for those strips is a ball. Watching him spurt out a laugh whenever you spout out some kind of filth, allowing yourself to do the same has been taking up your evenings in a decent way.

“Why not?” you ask. “Don’t need everyone knowing you’re drawing Popeye and Olive Oyl—?”  
  
“Buck, I swear to God, _enough_ ,” Steve says, but he’s laughing too, and all you can think is, why does it feel like you haven’t had this in forever? Ever since the business with Andy, ever since you caught Steve with Frannie Maltese and couldn’t shake the bite of jealousy, you haven’t been able to look at him right.

But now, you feel a little lighter. Even here, tucked in the corner of a greasy deli choked with people, you feel like you’re sat at the top of the damn world.

-

You don’t even know how it comes up, but throughout the rall, you find that you really, really like dancing. 

Steve has two left feet, but that doesn’t stop you from dragging him along, since the dames like you a little more when you have a friend. It means you’re no cad slinking all over the hall, looking for fresh pickings. You also find that you’re beginning to like girls a little more. Really like them, not just pretend that you do, like you did with Terri and Virginia, and if _that’s_ not the best thing to happen to you in weeks. 

At the dance hall, you swing them until their faces are red with exertion and you’re sweating like a couple of pigs. The Red Hook girls are fast, with warm darkness in their eyes. Loud laughs, and they actually know how to dance, compared to the crowd at St. Joseph’s, at the dances they sometimes held. You were stilted and stiff then, too, but now that the music is fast and rhythm gets into your body, you can’t help getting into it, so you go most Saturdays, even when Steve decides not to come.

But, it’s his absence that makes you start looking for a better crowd. A more exciting one, at least. You find it at a little hole in the wall that smells like whiskey and stale sweat and something you can’t quite place, but really like. You loosen your tie, your hair falls free of its Brylcreem, and notice that everyone dances close and a little dirty.

It’s your second time there, and you walk a sweet little thing named Marianne home, and she doesn’t live far from your building at all. She blows you a kiss, says, “See you around, sunshine,” before she disappears inside.

You’re drunk and a little off your rhythm, so you only think _who are you calling sunshine, blondie_ instead of saying it out loud. As you unlock your door with shaky hands, you think of her honey blond hair and how it felt in your hands, how soft her mouth was against yours, and then you’re stumbling into the apartment.

“I’m home,” you call out, but find Steve already in his pajama bottoms and his undershirt, sat at the table and bent over a canvas with his paints. So damn stubborn. 

“Yeah, smelled you before you opened the door,” Steve teases, raising his head up for just a second. “You have fun?”

“I _gotta_ take you sometime, Stevie, it’s a ball, I tell you,” you say, flopping onto the chair beside Steve, legs wobbly with the alcohol pumping through your veins. Strong stuff. Might turn you blind if you drank too much. “A real ball. You’ll love it. No one’ll care that you can’t dance. Everyone’s drunk, anyway.”  
  
“Sounds like a real riot,” Steve says, back to you, hair flopping over his brow. He needs to get it cut. You think you can do it for him. He usually does it for you, anyway. Why not return the favor? “But it doesn’t sound like my kinda crowd.”

“What crowd’s that?” you ask, mouth moving before your brain does. You grin and ruffle his hair, maybe too hard, hand lingering at the space between his shoulders. “Just come with me next time, huh? I don’t got as many friends as you think.”

Steve shakes his head. “You got whoever’s lipstick’s on your collar, Buck. You don’t need me.”

“Maybe not,” you say, a little too sulkily. The room feels a little hazy. Your fingers kind of numb. “Ya know, I feel like I never see you anymore.”

“We live under the same roof, pal.”  
  
“You know what I mean,” you say. “Come on, Steve. I just...don’t blame it on work or something, because...”

Of course, work ties into it. You barely see Becca and Ma these days, since they’re busy themselves, but even with the bursts of closeness, you feel more distant from Steve now than you did before you started living together. Whose fault that is, you don’t know. It might be yours. It might be Steve’s.  
  
You shake your head. “Say,” you start. You’re not getting caught up in this, because if you start talking, you’re not going to stop. You’ll ask what the hell the problem is, and if there isn’t one, you’ll make one. You’re feeling like the whiskey is turning into a truth serum. “Why don’t I teach you how to dance?””  
  
Steve chuckles at that. He pushes away from his work, and looks at you with tired eyes. He has a smudge of red paint on his jaw and you resist the urge to thumb it away. “You’re drunk, and you’re gonna teach me how to dance?” he says, shakes his head. “I gotta finish this up, anyway.”

“Hey, I’m a better dancer than you are, even when my head ain’t screwed on straight.” You shove up from your chair, moving to the center of the room. You kick off your shoes. It’s late, and the less noise you make stomping on the neighbors, the better. “And we can’t dance to Ozzie and Harriet, so find something better, huh?”  
  
Steve does, but he makes a stink about it, grumbling until he finds a station. _Dream a Little Dream of Me_ soon fills your ears and he comes closer. “Buck, even without shoes, I’m gonna crush your toes,” he says, but he isn’t really frowning. Maybe it’s your pickled brain playing tricks on you, but you think he looks nervous.

“Better mine than anyone else’s,” you say, and hold out your hand. “Come on over here. Pretend I’m a girl or something.”  
  
That earns you a scoff, but Steve shakes his head, takes your hand, and says, “Fine. Christ, Bucky, you win.”

“Three cheers for me!” you say.

Then Steve’s hand comes to your waist, warm and a little unsure, and you realize this is the worst idea you’ve ever had. The heat of his palm seeps through your shirt and into your skin, fingers tightening on your hip.

“Are you gonna move or what?” Steve says after...some time, and you jolt out of your thoughts.

“Nope,” you say, just to bug him, and put your free hand on his shoulder. “I’m the dame here, remember? Pull your head outta your ass, Rogers.”

“So far, you’re a rotten partner,” Steve says, as he leads you, a little jerky in his movements, with no rhythm to speak of. “Anyway, what’s your name?”  
  
“You can call me _anything_ you like, sunshine,” you say, a little saucy, just like Marianne said to you, and he holds back a grin, curses at you. Your stomach is tight and warm, not entirely unpleasant. “Focus on the music now, huh? This ain’t a play.”  
  
The music gets better. Bessie Smith and Harry James and Artie Shaw. Through it all, you try to teach him how to foxtrot. It’s a load of bickering, a load of Steve stepping on your feet, and then watching his own to make sure he doesn’t do it again. “ _Hey_ ,” you say dramatically, try not to snort a laugh in his face. “My eyes are up _here_ , mister!”

Steve doesn’t laugh. He’s too fed up with it all. “Well, if I can’t look at my feet, then where am I supposed to look?!” he snaps.

“Just listen to the goddamn music, alright?” you snap back. “This is supposed to be _fun_ , asshole. Just...do what I do, okay? Quit looking at your feet, you gotta look at me. Girls don’t like you not lookin’ at them.”

Steve’s jaw clenches a little, but he does what you say. His palm is sweating in yours. His movements are stiff, but he’s doing all the right steps. It takes another minute, takes your feet getting stomped on a few more times, but Steve gets the hang of it soon enough.

“Well, look at that,” you say, quieter than before, too aware of Steve’s other hand at your side now. “You’re a fast learner.”

“You’re just sayin’ that,” Steve says.  
  
“Nuh-uh.” You shake your head, find it hard to stop yourself from talking all over again. “Haven’t had my toes stepped on for more than thirty seconds, so I think I’ll call that an achievement. You’ll be the next Astaire if you let me keep teaching you.”  
  
“‘Cause you and Fred are such great pals,” Steve says, a little looser, a little more relaxed in his movements now that he’s not so worried about it all.  
  
“Bosom buddies, both of us,” you quip, eyes slipping to the dot of paint on his jaw again. “Hey, try giving me a spin, that’ll make the girls really like you.”  
  
“It’s your funeral,” Steve says, lets your waist go and then _whoosh._ You’re a little too light on your feet, so you stumble back, almost knock him down and say, a laugh lacing your words as your head dips down with it. “My fault. My fault.”  
  
“Maybe slow down on the sauce next time you’re teaching a class, Buck,” Steve says, helping you get back to your feet. You can’t help looking when his lips curl up at the corners. “Makes you seem real unprofessional.”

“I can just get you drunk next time,” you suggest with a shrug. “We’ll have a _lot_ more fun.”

 _Moonglow_ ends, and when _The Way You Look Tonight_ comes on right after, you both laugh a little. You raise your brows. “Speak of the devil,” you say, feeling a little less jaunty for some reason. “There’s old Fred now.”  
  
You saw _Swing Time_ the night it came out and you sang the song for a week straight, drove Steve and yourself nuts with it since it was a hell of an earworm, and now it’s back again. “Buck, I’m begging you not to,” Steve says, and your chest twists a little. He has a glint in his eyes, and you feel like you haven’t seen him genuinely smile in a long while. “I’ll get on my knees, I swear.”

You don’t answer. “ _Some day, when I’m awfully low,_ ” you sing, and Steve looks torn between smiling and frowning at you. Your voice ain’t _that_ bad, you know that. He’s used to your singing, anyway. “ _When the world is cold, I will feel a glow, just thinking of_ —aw, come on, Steve!”

He’s tugging away, and you grab his wrist before you can stop yourself. “I gotta finish this sign, I’m sorry,” Steve is saying. “Deadline’s tomorrow afternoon.”  
  
That’s a lie. Steve is fast. You’ve seen him finish commissions in a few hours, he just likes taking his time. “‘S it my singing?” you ask. “Finally getting sick of it?”  
  
“No. You’re a good singer, Buck,” Steve says, and comes close again when you tug him. “But I’ll tell you one thing.”  
  
You frown, feeling a little guarded. “What’s that?”  
  
“I think you’re the ugliest girl I’ve ever danced with.”  
  
That makes you both laugh, breaks the tension. Your head is dropping to his shoulder, just for a second, and you can feel his hands sweating. Feel his laugh as you murmur _fuck you_ into his skin. “Fuck you. I’d make a fine looking dame,” you say, and take the lead this time. “Come on, just one more song, and I’ll let you go. I just wanna see if you really got the hang of it.”

“Hey,” Steve says, and drags you closer. Flush against him, bodies fitting like puzzle pieces. Your breath catches in his throat. “I thought I was leading.”

“Oh, so you’re a pushy guy, huh?” you say, avoiding the flutter in your stomach, willing it to go away. His body is warm and sharp against yours, hands surer than before. “Maybe that’s why no one wants to dance with you.”

“Quit talking and sing, huh?” Steve says, and God, you swear he’s out for blood. If he keeps this up, keeps getting closer and teasing you think you might—

You shake it off, swallow any other jab trying to push its way out of you, and keep on singing. Do just as he says, because isn’t that what you always do? Everyone seems to think it’s you who drags Steve along, cajoles him into doing whatever, and, sure, sometimes you do, but it’s almost always Steve leading you, and it never takes much for you to give in.

Maybe you’re imagining it, but something shifts. 

You’re not really dancing anymore, just swaying, keeping in rhythm, but no one’s really leading anymore. Steve’s gaze goes anywhere but yours; to your chin, your shoulder, your fingers laced with his. Your heart is stuck in your throat as the song ends, and you can’t really look at him either. Just his hair, the side of his face, the smudge of paint on his jaw. You wonder if his hair would feel like Marianne’s did, thick and soft between your fingers.

“... _Never, never change. Keep that breathless charm,_ ” you continue, heart in your throat. ” _Won’t you please arrange it? ‘Cause...”_

You trail off. Your throat is too dry to continue. Steve isn’t moving and neither are you. There’s something thick and intangible in the air, wrapping around you and choking your breath away. You’re looking down, at the rise and fall of Steve’s skinny chest, at his socked feet planted firmly on the floor.

“Buck,” Steve says, and his sweat-slick fingers tighten around yours. You can barely hear him with the blood pounding in your ears, and you’re relieved for the lack of light, relieved he can’t see everything etched all over your face when you look up.  
  
His gaze is burning a hole through you, and you have no clue what to do. All the breath has been leeched out of you, and you wonder if you should just suck it up and _do it_ or say something.

You take your hand off his shoulder and slip your hand under his jaw. He doesn’t move away. He’s not breathing and he hasn’t taken his eyes off of you, and maybe this is it. Maybe you can do it and get the answer you want. If he pulls away, you can make an excuse, and if he _doesn’t_ .  
  
Well, wouldn’t that be something?

You think about it. You wet your lips and Steve’s throat, slim and pale, bobs hard.

And then you rub the smudge of red at jut of his jaw, fear getting the better of you. 

“Wipe that paint off your face before it stains, Picasso,” you croak, and Steve lets out a shaky laugh, but he doesn’t look at ease. He looks a little green.

“Yeah. Yeah, I should—” he says, and moves away, lets go of your hand, your waist. He’s already turning away when he continues. “I’m gonna finish this up. I’ll—don’t wait up. Get some sleep, why don’t you?”

And then he’s gone, and you’re left sick with regret. What if he wanted it, too? What if you’re not crazy after all? If you can like girls, and Steve, and Andy O’Reilly, why can’t Steve do the same?  
  
_Because he’s never shown a hint_ , you think. You’re hoping for the best, but the truth is, maybe you scared him off. Maybe, he’ll have second thoughts sticking around now if he thinks he’s got you figured out.

Steve slides back into his chair, picking up his brush. The strap of his undershirt slips down his shoulder, and you stuff your hands into your pockets, watch the way he rubs at the back of his neck. You don’t care if he catches you staring. Your skin is hungry for him to touch you again.

“Yeah,” you say, feeling a little too sorry for yourself. You pad across the room, the song still filling your ears, the words hitting a little too close to home. So, what? You’re a sappy drunk, and that’s all there is to it. “Night, Steve.”

-

Steve doesn’t avoid you.

In fact, he’s more talkative, and you’re the one who clams up, and if that isn’t a turn of events. You’re a little hungover, sure, you feel like something’s died in your mouth, but when Steve asks you to come with him to drop off his sign, you decline, say you’re gonna stop at home, check on Becca and Ma.

They’re not there. So, you let yourself in, and just...sit a while. Try not to think about anything at all, because the mess in your head is driving you up the walls.

You were drunk last night, but not as drunk as you could have been. You can remember every little detail. The way Steve’s throat bobbed with nerves, the way he looked when you reached out to touch him. Hell, your thumb is still stained with the paint you wiped away, a sheer smear of red. You want to put it to your lips, but you don’t. You want to bleach all of this out of your brain, but at the same time, you can’t. You don’t want to lose everything you’re feeling, because you feel like a part of you might leave with it.

  
So, if this is all you can ever have with him—stolen touches and hesitation, moments never spoken of again—you’ll take it.

-

A sharp gasp fills your ears and then, “James Buchanan Barnes, you piece of _shit_.”

You whip around to find Ma, wide-eyed and angry, with two grocery bags in her arms. ”Oh,” you laugh, unable to stop yourself. “Jesus, I’m sorry, I thought Mrs. O’Halloran would’ve told you I was in here.”

“James, the woman is over ninety years old. She doesn’t even remember what she had for breakfast this morning,” Ma snaps, slams the bags down on the counter, and presses her hand to her chest, but she puffs out a laugh. “You gave me a heart attack.”  
  
“Real nice to see you too,” you say, and push up from the armchair. “Scoot over. I’ll put this away.”

“What brought you over now, huh?” Ma asks, whacks you on the back a little too hard as you start unpacking the bags. “Thought you were getting too good for us. Both of you.”

There it is. Two halves of the same whole. Can’t mention one without mentioning the other. You shrug, try and fail to not think about the fact that it doesn’t bother you as much as it should. “Steve’s been running all over, trying to get eyes on his art,” you say. “I’ve been working.”  
  
“Mhm,” Ma hums. She says nothing for a long while, and when you put the last can in the pantry, she says, “You know, you always go quiet when you’re upset. Can’t get a word out of you.”

You can’t help feeling _caught_. About what, you’re not sure, but it’s the same clench in your stomach, the same shattering in your brain, which immediately starts running a mile a minute. “I’m keeping busy,” you say, staring a hole into the shelf. “I barely talk to Steve either, and we live in the same apartment.”

“Haven’t seen you at mass in weeks, either,” Ma presses. “Something’s going on with you, Jamie.”

“You know, I didn’t come here to get grilled about my feelings,” you bark. “I just came to check in.”

“See that?” Ma says, voice raising. “That’s not you. Since when do you snap at me?”

It’s not a fight. Not really. You’re both loud, and don’t really think about what you’re saying till it’s out of your mouths, and maybe that could have given you a bad relationship, but it hasn’t yet.

“You know,” you say, and turn around. “I’m gonna get out of your hair. I guess I’m not in such a good mood after all.”

“Stop right there,” she says, and grabs you by the crook of your arm, her other hand coming to your shoulder. You don’t look at her, just keep your eyes on the door. Jaw clenched tight. It’s childish, but you don’t care. “Go sit down. If you don’t want to talk about what’s eating you, that’s fine, but don’t leave that way. Don’t leave angry.”

“Fine,” you say, force yourself to deflate, but you squirm away from the touch nonetheless. “Fine.”  
  
-

You haven’t smoked much lately, and you realize that’s part of the reason why you’re so jittery. “Between work and it being so damn cold, don’t really got the time,” you say through a cloud of it. “Can’t smoke inside, either, since it gets to Steve’s lungs. He says he don’t mind it, and I know he means that, but I guess I feel a little rotten, knowin’ it’s my fault he’s coughing.”

You’re already on your second cigarette, not feeling any better. Ma is only halfway through her first. “So, you’re not fighting, then,” she says, like she’s been trying to figure you out this whole time, and you guess she has. “Is it that Maltese girl?”

  
“Terri moved away in _June_ ,” you say, then purse your lips. “Becca coming back soon?”  
  
“Not for a while,” Ma says. “Why?”  
  
“Something I wanted to ask you,” you say. You chew on your cheek for a second before you continue. “Been wanting to ask for a while. And I mean, you could cut me off if you don’t want—”  
  
She shakes her head. “Devel žanel,” she says. “Spit it out already.”

“Why don’t you talk to your family anymore?” you ask. “I ain’t a kid anymore. Isn’t it time I know what happened?”  
  
Ma stares at you for a minute, and her mouth twists up around her cigarette before she smashes the butt into the ash tray. “The short version of the story is that they didn’t like your father, didn’t want me around him, so I left,” she says. “Came to Brooklyn with him.”  
  
“What’s the long version?” you ask, because you know she’s waiting for you to.  
  
“Go put some coffee on and I’ll tell you,” she says. “Because you’ll be here for a while.”

-

It’s a long story, all right.

Ma and her family lived in Manhattan first, and that’s how she met your father. They were children together, knew each other well enough, but her family was always more withdrawn. She hung around your father’s sister, Rebecca. An aunt you never knew, since she died in her sleep when she was fourteen. That just left Ma with Pop, who didn’t have many friends as it was. Ma was in the same boat. No friends, just her parents and two brothers, Peter, who was too much older than her and engaged, and James, who had just turned seven years old.

They were thirteen, and it didn’t really mean anything, them hanging around each other, until it did. Until a few years passed, and she had a world of secrets, and was slapped with the possibility of moving to Philadelphia at the end of the year, since New York wasn’t treating her family well at all. And then her cover was blown. Everyone and their mother knew George Barnes, the son of one of the biggest bankers in Manhattan, was seeing Winifred Samuel, who wasn’t poor at all, but hated regardless.

This led to a domino effect. Screaming matches between Ma and her family, Pop being cut off from his family’s fortune for being with her. He couldn’t stand them anyway, apparently. He had a brute of a father who had beat him bloody his whole life, and a mother who didn’t much care either way. He got a shiner from your Uncle Peter, who told him to stay away from your Ma, or he’d do a lot worse.

The thing was, he did. He didn’t want to cause her any trouble, so he stood away, planned on finding a way to Indiana, to stay with some aunt who was willing to take him in, but your Ma is nothing if not stubborn, so she tracked him down to ask _just what the hell he thought he was doing_. He said he was trying to do her a favor, since her family loved her, and he didn’t want to take that away from her. She said they must not love her that much, since they were set on making her unhappy. She said she’d hang back from going to Philadelphia, and if they were willing to turn their backs on her, she’d learn to live with it, because there was no way she was leaving your father behind. She said she’d marry him, if that’s what he wanted.

His response? _“I mean, if you want to, Fred, it’s not up to me.”_ So, Ma said, _“You’re the one who’s supposed to ask, dinlo, not me.”_

She broke the news to her family, who, of course, didn’t take it well. That was a riot and a half. Her mother and father cried, begged her to stay before they decided they wanted nothing more to do with her, Peter went steely and silent and refused to look her in the eye, but James had hugged her goodbye. She says that alone almost made her change her mind, but she made her bed. and she was going to lie in it.

The Samuels left for Philadelphia. The Barneses were unable to be reached, but Pop’s mother had shown up one day with a big lump of cash, and squeezed your Ma so tight she couldn’t breathe, and then she was gone.

So, Winnie and George were seventeen and married in 1916, and moved to Brooklyn right after. A year later, you showed up. And then the war came, and Pop left for France and came back fine enough. Then Rebecca, named for a long dead sister and friend, came along. Then, Pop died in a garage. Got himself crushed under a car. A broken rib punctured his lung and he died choking on his own blood before anyone could help him. He was twenty-one.

That seemed old to you when you were a kid, but Jesus, you’re only two years younger than he was when he died.

“You never thought about looking up your family after that?” you ask.

Ma shakes her head, looking lighter with the truth despite the heaviness in her eyes. “My mother tried to get in touch a few times,” she says. “They heard what happened somehow. She came here, you know. You answered the door, but you were so little, I doubt you remember.”

God, yes, _yes_ , you remember. You couldn’t have been more than five. There was a woman at the door, dark eyes like Ma, wiry and thin, black hair striped with grey. She looked at you, and she seemed almost happy to see you, but there was something sad in the bottom of her eyes. Before either of you could say anything, your ma was behind you. “Jas ando kher,” she said in a rush. It wasn’t mean, just impatient. You were left standing in the same spot, looking between your ma and the woman. “ _Now_ , James. Go.”

“She didn’t hang around long,” you say instead of answering, the memory of hushed, hissing voices and then a door slamming shut fills your head. “You two fought, huh?”

Ma shrugs, arms crossed tight. “I kicked her out,” she says. “I didn’t want anything to do with her, considering how long it took her to come around.”

There’s a question lodged in the back of your throat, but it won’t come out. It sticks stubbornly, and you think you might choke on it. “What do you think you would have done, if it was switched around?” you manage to ask, and her brows knit together. “Say it was you and Becca, or you and me.”

“Well, I wouldn’t do what my mother did, I’ll tell you that,” Ma says, a little sharply, like she’s being accused. “And I’d be a hypocrite if I ever did that to either of you.”  
  
You hum, and take a swig from your coffee, gone cold and a little viscous in your mouth. “Guess I just wanted to know what happened. Felt like you were sitting on a secret forever.”  
  
“Everybody’s got their secrets, chavo.” She pins you with a look. “No crime in keeping a few, but if you feel like they’re eating you alive, you have to let them out.” 

You want to laugh at that. You really do, but you don’t. Can’t. “You know,” you say. “You’re the second person to tell me something like that.”

“Probably won’t be the last,” Ma says. “So, now it’s my turn to ask the bigger questions. What’s going on with you?”

Of course, she wasn’t going to drop it. This time, you do laugh. You shrug heavily, and look right at her. “Why don’t you guess?” you ask. “You know me so well, so why don’t you just guess?”

“I don’t have to guess,” Ma says, too sure for your liking. “I already know.”  
  
“That so?” you press.

She gives you a look. “Don’t be smart with me.”

“Ain’t being smart,” you say, raise your hands up. “Just talking.”

“You’re in love with Steve.”

It’s not an accusation. It’s not said with venom, just as fact, but the words are like a bullet striking true to its target, leaving the weight you’ve been carrying crashing down even harder on you, and you think you might crumble with it this time.  
  
Your voice is a rasp, lungs feeling tighter with every breath, when you finally say, “Jesus.” You swallow hard, resist the urge to grind your teeth to dust. “What gave me away?”

  
The air is thicker, heavier, than before, and you feel like you’re being pulled apart, stretched thin like taffy as Ma looks at you with something raw and miserable in her face. “You’re not a discreet as you think,” she says. “But only someone who knows you can see that.”

“So, you’re not gonna kick me out?” you ask before you can stop yourself. You almost want to cover your mouth, pull the words back in. You keep your eyes on the rug, on the old stain in the corner. Your fault. “Not gonna say you—”  
  
“For God’s sake, what did I just say?” Ma snaps. “Do you really think I’m going to judge you? Did you hear anything I said?”  
  
“It ain’t the same.” You shake your head. “You know it ain’t the same. If Steve was a dame, we wouldn’t even have to _talk_ about this.”  
  
“It’s close enough,” she says.

“He’s not that way, anyhow, he’s—” You swallow thickly, feeling feverish. Shaky. You scrub your hands over your face, and then leave them there. “He’s normal.”

“And you’re not?” she asks, and all of a sudden, her strong, skinny fingers are pulling your hands away, forcing you to look up as they come to your face. Always cold, just like yours. “We know, better than most, what it’s like to be shunned for what you are. If God didn’t strike you down for being born with my blood, he won’t strike you down for this.”

She’s right. You know dirty looks and backhanded comments, you know that the wrong people will want to beat your face in just for being you. They’ve done it to others, and you’re no exception.

“But listen, and listen _good_ , Yasha,” Ma continues. “Don’t make yourself sick. If he doesn’t love you the way you want him to, find someone who will. I won’t watch you do this to yourself.”

You do something you never thought you’d do. You lie to her.

You rasp out, “Yeah.” You nod, lean into the touch. “Yeah, okay.”

You’re many things, but you’re not stupid. Whether he knows it or not, Steve’s doused you in gasoline and stands waiting with a book of matches in his hand. And even if he burns you to a pile of ash and bone, you won’t be able to shake him.

-

  
You go out more. 

You go out a lot, and avoid Steve as much as you can.  
  
You come back from work, clean yourself up, put on your best clothes, and go right back out. You’re real nice when you have to be, and if the girls want you rougher around the edges, that’s just what you are. You’re on your second drink when two hands come to your shoulders, and a warm, velvety voice close to your ear says, “Where the hell have _you_ been?”

Marianne is grinning at you, and so you smile back, easy with the whiskey coursing through your veins. “Up and down, over, around,” you say over the music. “Been wondering when I was gonna bump into you again.”  
  
She’s taller than you remember, and wearing a pale blue dress, hugging her a little too nicely, and almost matching her eyes. She’s not shy about touching you now, her hand coming up to your chest. No one gives you any scandalized looks. Not here. There’s plenty of folks doing a lot worse, anyway. “Well, here I am!” she says, and puts her hands up as if to say _ta-da!_ before she grabs your wrist with both hands. “Come on, handsome, they’re playin’ our song.”

-

Marianne is a riot and a half. You feel a little wild around her, just like before. She lets you pull her close when you dance with her, and wraps her arms around your neck to keep her close. And she doesn’t blush or pale when you lean into her ear to murmur, “Say, why don’t we blow this joint?”

Her brows raise, and she chuckles, low and warm. “I didn’t take you for that kind of guy,” she says. “Thought you were some altar boy, just kissed the girls goodnight and went on your way.”  
  
The music is vibrating right through you, Marianne’s eyes on your face making you a little dizzy. “Kissing’s just fine,” you say. “But I think we got some unfinished business.”  
  
“I’ll say,” Marianne giggles. “Meet me outside, and maybe I’ll take you up on it.”  
  
-

She does. You walk her home, but this time she lets you in since her roommate, Tilly, is out of town. You let her push you onto the armchair, and then you have a lap full of her, all creamy skin and blonde curls and rose perfume and the sharp stench of gin. You feel drunk enough as it is, but she’s leaving you reeling.

“Jesus, you’re somethin’ else,” you say hoarsely, breathless from kissing her. Your hands are at the zipper of her dress, heart in your throat. It’s been a while. You could do with not thinking and just focusing this.  
  
Marianne laughs at that. “Bet you say that to all the girls,” she says.

“Nuh-uh,” you say, and your grin is devilish. You can feel it in your blood, but you’re laughing too when you continue. “Just you, baby doll.”

-

Somehow, you end up on Marianne’s rickety little bed with her squirming under you, dress abandoned. You’re peeling her nylons off and when you kiss a soft spot on her ankle, move up her leg, she looks pleasantly surprised. “Oh, you _really_ like girls,” she says and chuckles breathlessly.

 _Oh, honey, if you only knew what you just said_ , you think, but then again, you might like girls just fine after all. You hope you do. If you like a little bit of both, if you’re half and half, just like your blood is, maybe you’ll end up just fine. “Ain’t no crime in a lady feeling good,” you say

“Oh, you think we’re sweet, Buck?” Marianne eggs on as you drag your mouth up her shin, the side of her knee, and she’s already spreading her thighs for you. You come closer, bite into soft skin, and her fingers immediately knot in your hair, pull it free from the way you slicked it back. “Think we taste sweet, too?”

“Nothin’ else for me to think, sweetheart,” you say, low in your chest, and lean forward to get your mouth on her.

-

You meet Marianne a lot after that.

She’s fun to be around. She’s mean and stubborn and tells it like it is. She tastes like your cigarettes and lipstick and has a big laugh and smile. And the biggest difference is that you actually _like her_. You like being around her.

Steve, on the other hand, can’t stand her. 

He doesn’t say it to your face, of course, but you can tell. His smile is tight and impatient the first time he ever meets her, but to be fair, you’re necking in the doorway of your apartment, fumbling with keys. Another time, she asks you to bring him out to the pictures since she has a friend who’s ‘just the same as him, about this high and a real tough nut to crack’, and Steve says he’s not feeling well, so he asks for a rain check.

You’re feeling a little miffed when you come home to find him perfectly fine.

“What the hell?” you ask incredulously. “You turned that girl down, flat out _lied_ to her, so you could stay home and listen to the goddamn radio?”  
  
Steve barely looks up from his food. “I wasn’t up for a date,” he says.  
  
“You’re an asshole, you know that?” you say, drop your keys onto the counter hard before you point at him. “And you’re gonna make up for it. I’m gonna tell Marianne you said you’re taking Ruth out on Friday since you’re feeling better. You should’ve seen her face, Steve, it was _sad_ .”  
  
Steve looks up, already wound tight. “Yeah, well, what if I didn’t want to go out with her?”  
  
“You’ve never even met her!”  
  
“And you have?”  
  
“Sure did!” you say, maybe too loudly. “She’s a little hardass like you. She hates dancing, she’s pretty, and she’s a painter, you _idiot_ . You think Marianne just picked some broad off the street? She was a catch! Maybe you could’ve—”  
  
“Jesus, Bucky, _enough_ , alright?”

“I just don’t get you,” you continue, shake your head. “Don’t make any goddamn _sense_ , you sulking around here all day. I—you ever even think about trying finding someone?”  
  
“You ever think about trying not to screw anything that moves?” Steve asks.

“At least I’m not holed up in here!” You’re shouting now. You’re so angry you could spit, and you don’t even know _why_ , but you can’t stop yourself from ranting, chest heaving with it as you blurt out, “You don’t get it. You just don’t get it, Steve, it’s like—like you get a kick out of diggin’ your hands through my guts and I’m just supposed to sit back and let you—”

Steve is staring at you with his jaw set, waiting for you to finish. The air is thick. His expression is off. Your heart is pounding so hard you can feel it in your mouth, and you don’t think you can trust yourself to continue.

“You know what?” you start, low and hoarse.

“What’s that?” Steve snaps back. Oh, when he starts that, you’ll both scream yourselves hoarse. He’s probably been waiting for this. Hell, maybe you have, too, you can feel a fight coming on before it even happens.

You huff, a humorless thing. You even don’t bother taking your coat off. “I don’t gotta take this.”

“Neither do I!” Steve’s standing up now. “So, what’s making you stick around?”  
  
“I’m going out,” you say instead of answering. “Don’t wait up.”  
  
He rolls his eyes hard, hands on his hips. “Really, Bucky?” he presses. “Where are you gonna go? Back to Marianne’s?”  
  
“I already got one scrawny blond giving me an earful, so hell no.” You tug your scarf on tighter, point a finger at him again. “I told you, _don’t_ wait up. You wanna go pick a fight with someone, maybe look for someone who ain’t me, because I’m getting real sick and tired of your schtick, Rogers.”

Truth is, you think you’re sick and tired of your own schtick, too. You’re sick of Steve sitting around, not finding anyone he’s interested in because now, it’s just the two of you all the time, and you’re beginning to feel like your bones are made of nails, like you’re getting scratched from the inside out.

“Yeah? Well, you’re no prize yourself!” Steve shouts as you slam the door behind you. You lean back against it, just for a second. 

The door creaks under your back, and you wonder if Steve is doing the same thing.

You wonder if you should go back inside. It’s freezing, and you have no clue where you’re going to go from here before you remember the bar Eddie from the docks told you about. You could use the dark rush of whiskey down your throat. Marianne’s trying not to smoke, and she kind of hates the way you taste now, so you’ve been avoiding it lately. Your barely touched pack sits heavy in your pocket.

-

It takes a bit of walking, of asking around, but you find the place, Odie’s, easy enough, tug the door open just as fat snowflakes begin to fall. You say you’re a pal of Eddie’s, and then, surprisingly, he comes out, red-cheeked and drunk, his blond hair falling from its pomade. “Jimmy!” he shouts, like he’s known you for years. “You finally showed up, you little bastard!”

He drags his heavy arm around your neck, and tugs you close as he leads you toward the back. “You’re gonna love this, I tell you,” Eddie says, stinking like the mustiness of a basement, the sourness of vomit. “You play cards, right? You any good?”  
  
“Uh,” you say. Your head is spinning already, and not unpleasantly. Yeah, you’re good. Real good, but Eddie doesn’t need to know that. “Yeah. I guess so.”  
  
“Oh, that’s swell,” Eddie says, and opens a door tucked away from the scatter of people before he leans in close. “That’s real swell. We’re gonna have some fun. Promise you, buddy.”

-

You have fun, all right. The whiskey’s bad and the guys, Eddie included, are sleazeballs, but you’re feeling lighter and easier, and you’re on a winning streak that a couple people praise you for, since they think you’re a rookie. “I gotta get whatever luck you got,” an older Italian guy, John, says. He’s good so far. Maybe a little better than you are, but not by much. “You from Brooklyn?”  
  
Your eyes are on your cards. Four of a kind. You’re chewing your inner cheek, assessing them hard and trying to ignore the sweep of excitement in your gut because you’re so close to winning you can taste it. 

“Born and bred,” you say, still holding up the facade that you’re not so good at this. You’ve got a hell of a poker face, always have. Steve wouldn’t last two minutes down here, considering the way he always gave his cards away without you even looking at them. “World ends at the East River.”

That makes him laugh, loud and hearty. “I like this kid!” he says to no one in particular, and then his eyes are back on his cards. “You like where you’re from. That’s good. Ain’t trying to hitch a ride west like everyone else.”

You don’t respond, since he gets to talking with someone else. The game isn’t tense, but there’s an undercurrent to it, a current that grows when you lay your winning hand down for the fourth time. You don’t care. All the guys keep saying _fast learner_ and _beginner’s luck_ , anyway. They won’t know what hit ‘em.

-

As the game stretches on, most of the guys pull out. Some go home, some just hang around to watch and drink themselves blind. It’s down to you and John now. Eddie and Paul and Walt are watching from the sides like a goddamn tennis match. You lose some of your winnings, but you always come back around, get them back just as fast along with everyone else’s. Currently, you have $13 and two packs of cigarettes.  
  
“All right, kid, time we upped the stakes,” John says, eyes red with the clouds of cigarette smoke, a sheen of sweat on his brow from the countless drinks he has in him. “Last hand. Winner takes all. What do you say?”  
  
Some of your good manners have slipped away. You laugh, A pitched, wheezy thing. “If that’s what you wanna do, pal,” you say, avoid the tickle in your throat that kind of makes you want to puke. Some of your sense has gone, too, so you slap the last of today’s wages on the table. If you tank, you’re in trouble. Big trouble. You know that, but you have a good feeling, You can feel it like the burn of alcohol in your chest. Maybe you and Stevie can make up if you come out of this with your pockets a little fuller than before.

“That’s what I wanna do,” John says, serious, and pulls out his wallet, pulls a few bills out.

You blanch when he drops the money on the table. You could tell he was rich, but you didn’t—

“$100,” John says, and shrugs, arms open. “It’s yours or mine, Jimmy boy. So deal ‘em out.”

“Jesus, John, you carry that much around?” Walt says, almost incredulous. “You got rocks in your head.”  
  
John waves him off. “Mind your business,” he says. “Start the game, Jim.”  
  
Your fingers fumble, but you shuffle the cards just fine, Deal them to John and yourself.

It’s a haze for a while, and you don’t know if your poker face is slipping. Don’t know if John can see your expression as you take in your cards, but your throat dries up.  
  
“All right,” John says after some time. Your head is too hazy to be sure of how much. God, you’ve been here for hours. The clock says it’s half past three in the morning. _Witching hour_ , you think. “Moment of truth.”  
  
“Moment of truth,” you echo around your cigarette, almost down to the butt. You grin. “Count of three?”  
  
John laughs. “Why not? Count it down, Wally.”  
  
Walt pushes forward. He looks the most smashed out of the five of you. He holds up his fist, makes a big deal out of it. “One! Two!” he slurs. You and John don’t look away from each other, like a goddamn Mexican standoff. “Three!”  
  
You and John slam your hands down. He has a full house. You have a straight flush. Eddie screams bloody murder and so do you. You can’t help it.

“HAD IT IN THE BAG!” Eddie shouts, and he, Walt, and Paul are grabbing you, shaking you and cussing and shoving another drink in your hand. Paul echoes, blaring in your ear. “Had it in the fucking bag! He knew it, too! Look at him! Look at Barnes’ fucking face!”

John looks a little miffed, but truth is, a guy like that might not care too much about losing his money. If you give him shit about it, yeah, maybe, but you aren’t gonna jinx this. No way. You’re set. You’re _set_.

“I’m gonna try to get that back,” John jokes, loud over the guys yelling, and grasps your drunken hand in a firm shake. “You’re good, Barnes. Real good.”  
  
“Good game, pal,” you manage to say. The hem of his jacket stretches up. You can see a gold watch on his hand. Brand new. You didn’t get things like that unless you were old money, and John didn’t seem that type at all. Jesus, where the hell did Eddie bring you? If this guy’s mob, you should do your best not to run into him again. Not to talk too much.

It’s a blur after that. You give the guys their packs of cigarettes back, since your drunken head decides you already have a pack. You slip Eddie a couple bills, but he looks at you like you’ve lost your goddamn mind. Tells you to keep it. “Thanks for tellin’ me about this, anyway, Edds,” you say. Slap him hard on the shoulder.

-

“You’re comin’ back next week right?” Eddie asks as he walks out with you. “Try to make it, lucky. Hey! Lucky Bucky!” he laughs at that like it’s the funniest thing he’s ever heard. “I’m calling you that from now on!”

By the time you make it out, part ways with Eddie, there’s a fine layer of snow on the ground, barely disturbed save for a few footprints. You find your way home on the empty streets, and you almost feel like you’ve done something wrong, but it’s quickly forgotten when you realize _how much_ you could do now.

You can finally put some more money away. You can stop worrying about scrambling to make the rent. You can get some real nice things for Steve and Ma and Rebecca once Christmas rolls around. 

Your pay from the docks, Steve’s pay from the store and selling his art, painting signs, won’t feel like scraping by. Hell, you ain’t rich. Not at all. But you can _breathe_. Jesus, isn’t that something? All because of a card game in a goddamn basement.

Once you find your building, you hold onto both railings and haul yourself up the stairs. Curse at the bite of freezing cold on your palms. Imagine if they stuck. Wouldn’t that be your luck.

You pull your keys out and miss the lock twice before you get inside, surprised by the burst of heat that melts the ice from your bones. You rinse your face at the sink, gulp in a handful of water before you step into the bedroom as quiet as you can.

Steve’s asleep, of course. Arm hanging off the edge of the bed, covered past his neck. You can’t see anything aside from the line of his big nose, his closed eyes. The mess of his hair. He has work in the morning, so maybe you shouldn’t bother him at all, but he’s a light sleeper anyhow, he’ll wake up soon enough ‘cause of your racket.

“Psst. Steve,” you whisper. You move closer, sink to your knees on the floor. Rub your hand over his covered shoulder. “Stevie, wake up, pal. Got something to show you.”

A sharp inhale. Steve flops onto his back, rubs his hands over his face hard. “Wh’timeisit?” he mumbles into his palms.

“Late,” you answer quietly. “Real late. Sorry for wakin’ you up, but it’s, I think it’s good news.”  
  
“You’re joinin’ the circus,” Steve says, voice low and thick with sleep. Flops his hands down to the bed, and wrinkles his nose. “Ugh. God, you stink, Buck.”

You snort at that. “I always stink,” you say. “Don’t know how you put up with me.”

“I put up with you because I know you’ll take a bath,” Steve says. His voice isn’t hard. You can’t see him so well, but your eyes are adjusting, and his face isn’t tense, either. It might be softening. You aren’t too sure. “Or ‘cause I know you’ll put on cologne to hide the fish guts or whatever else stuck to you.”

“Hm.” It’s a laugh, and it isn’t. You rest a hand on his shoulder, skinny and knobby beneath your palm. Smooth, dry skin. “Don’t know how you put up with me,” you repeat, drop your head lower. “You’re a trip, you know that? A real trip, Steve.”

Steve snorts. “Bet you say that to all the girls.”

“Only the pretty ones,” you quip, and Steve actually laughs at that. He turns on his side to face you, arm tucked beneath his pillow. “I mean it, though.” Your knees are digging into the floorboards, about as warm as it is outside. Your hand is still on Steve’s shoulder and he hasn’t moved it, so you squeeze gently, give him a shake without trying to. 

“Look, I’m real sorry about earlier, all right?” you blurt out before Steve can get a word in. “And I know you’re gonna brush me off about it and say it don’t matter or somethin’ but I feel rot—rotten about it. I didn’t mean it. I just don’t want you to be alone, is all. You got...Steve, you’re a good guy and I guess I—“

Your words are failing you. You’re getting choked up for some reason, so you smile tightly. Even now, you have to watch it. You have to watch yourself as best you can. “Hey, lemme make it up to you,” you say instead of continuing. You reach into the inside pocket of your jacket. “Turn the light on.”

With a huff, Steve flops over, and he clicks the lamp on, gapes when he sees the half crumpled stack in your hand. 

“When the hell did you get this?” he demands. “How much is that?”

“One _hundred_ and _fifteen_ fuckin’ _dollars_.” You feel smug, giddy with it as you grin wolfishly at him, and Steve’s eyes turn to saucers. “Played poker at this hole in the wall all night, it gets down to me and this one guy. Real rich. He bet it all since he thought he had it in the bag. Fooled him, though, huh?”

“And he’s not from the mob?” Steve asks, only half-joking. He looks like he’s about to have some kind of fit. “He’s not gonna—he’s not gonna have someone throw you over the bridge for cheating him out of his money?”

“He might be, but hell no. ‘Sides I won it fair—and— _square_.” You punctuate that by poking him in the center of his chest with each word. Your head is swimming a little. Steve is too close. The lamp is too bright and too dim at the same time. “He lost, I won. Simple as that. And he was good, too. Just as good as me. I was sweatin’ like crazy, thought I was gonna lose everything!”

Steve is sitting further up now. “I,” he starts, shakes his head and sputters a laugh out. “Christ, Bucky. Only you. Only you could do that.”

You shrug, hold your arms out. “That’s ‘cause I’m one of a kind.”

You’re laughing now, a low snicker that just won’t stop. “Oh, thank god for Eddie,” you sigh, and lean back against the wall. “I’d go out and celebrate, but uh...kinda just got back.”

“That you did.”

Your stomach clenches hard, turns cold and slick. “Oh,” you say dimly. “And I think I’m about to lose my lunch.”

“Oh,” Steve echoes as you slap your hand over your mouth. Then rips the covers off himself, only dressed in his skivvies. Idiot. He needs to dress warmer, even if he’s going to bed. “Oh. Shit, just—hold it in. Lemme get a bucket.”

Thank God, he does, because the minute it’s in front of you, you’re sticking your head in it. Barely anything comes up for a minute, so you just keep dry heaving, spitting to get the taste of whiskey out of your mouth, the burn from your throat. Then, it hits you hard. Leaves you doubling over.

“Oh, _Christ_ ,” you groan. It sounds all tinny since your head is stuck in the bucket. You choke on another wave of sickness. “Never mind what I said. Fuck Eddie and fuck his fuckin’ poker game.”

“Yeah, yeah,” Steve says, and when his hand, blissfully cold, comes to the nape of your neck, you almost shudder. Either from the touch or sickness. You aren’t sure. “Quit talking and get all of that out.”

“Thanks for the advice, doc. Real trustworthy guy, you—“

Back to heaving, but maybe you don’t mind it because Steve’s fingers are tracing patterns into your skin, and he doesn’t say a word when you lean into the touches.

You just wish it was different circumstances, is all.

-

You aren’t sure how long you sit there, puking until there’s nothing left for you to give, your gut eating at itself until you finally stop. Catch your breath. You breathe out through your mouth as you pull away, one hand clutched around the bucket.

There’s a glass of water two inches from your face. “Drink up,” Steve says, not as pushy as he’d like to be. “You’ll feel worse if you don’t.”

You swallow down a jab and another mouthful of bile. “Thanks,” you croak, and take the glass, run it against your sweaty forehead. “Christ, Steve, I’m sorry about—“

“Quit apologizing,” Steve says, but it’s fond. He shifts down to sit on the floor beside you, back against the bed. A slim, cool hand shoves at your shoulder, gentle. “It’s _us_ , Buck. Come on.”

You take a long gulp of cold water, swish it in your mouth a few times. “Yeah,” you say, rough in your abused throat, and maybe it’s because you had a little too much to drink, but your chest feels full. “That’s about all we got, huh?”

Why don’t you feel like this around Marianne? Sure, she’s a great girl. Sure, you feel a jolt of something like excitement around her but not—you don’t feel _easy_. You don’t feel right.

You want to say as much. Say that maybe you don’t want to go steady with her, or that maybe she just ain’t the girl for you, but you don’t. You can’t, and you don’t know why, because why would Steve mind? You don’t think he expects anything of you, and that’s a good thing, right? No expectations aside from sticking around, not turning your back. 

“Think I’ll sleep on the sofa,” you say instead, and force yourself off the floor, taking the bucket with you. “I ain’t gonna keep you up with me yakking all night.”

“Oh, come on—“

You shake your head, try not to trip over your own feet as you step backward into your excuse of a sitting room. “Nope, it ain’t gonna be pretty. You’re taking an early shift at Seville’s, right? You gotta get some rest, pal.”

Steve stands, a mess of skin and bones. Hair still mussed from tossing and turning. “Just let me know if you get sick, alright?” he says.

You probably won’t. He always wants to owe you for cleaning up his scrapes or helping him through his fevers, but he doesn’t owe you anything. You don’t do what you do expecting favors in return. “Yeah, sure,” you say. “Night, Stevie.”

Even in the dark, you can see the way his mouth perks up. Just a little. He leaves the door ajar to let some of the heating come through. “Night, Buck,” he says. 

-

You don’t sleep for a while. You drink more water. You brush the taste of puke from your mouth, but the toothpaste makes you feel sick, too, so you open the window, and light up a cigarette. It’s too cold to go out on the fire escape, so you just lean out a little, letting smoke and cool, blissful air fill your lungs, dry the sweat on your skin.

Your head feels stuffed with cotton, stomach coiled tight, so you stay there for a while, and the chill in the air helps, eases the knots in your neck. Snow is sticking to the fire escape, to the window sill, and you breathe it all in—the sharpness of the cold, the distant, yeasty smell of bread from the bakery around the corner, the comforting, acrid smell of the radiator as it rattles away.

You think about how you and Steve talked about seeing the world outside of Brooklyn, but you think the city’s pollution, its endless thrum of noise has gotten into your bones and blood, and you can’t imagine staying away for too long. 

You shut your eyes for a long while, head resting on your forearm, cigarette dangling out the window.

-

You wake up to grey skies, to your breath fogging in front of you, and all you can think is _cold_.

You’re so cold your teeth are clacking together. Hands shaking. Feet freezing through your dress shoes and socks. _What the hell happened?_ is all you can think and then—

The window. _Goddamn it._

Somehow, in your drunken fog, you must have hobbled to the couch, but managed to forget to close the window even though you knew it was snowing. With a hiss of a curse, you shoot up on legs heavy and shaking with a hangover, with grogginess and cold, and slam the window shut. Lock it tight.

“Fuck,” you mumble to yourself, voice scratchy and deep in your chest, and then again, louder, when you notice the bedroom door open. “Steve?” you call.

You stride across the room and shove the door open. “Steve?” Maybe he’s fine, maybe he got up and left for his shift and just got a little pissed that you left the window open, but...wouldn’t he close it, if that was the case? Wouldn’t he—

“Oh, shit,” you puff out, heart already pounding too quickly as you move toward his bed, to the lump under the blankets. “Steve? Hey, come on, pal. You gotta get up.”

You’re leaning down, shaking him, maybe a little too hard, and he makes a miserable noise. The crazed part of your brain thinking the worst shuts up. “Can’t,” Steve answers, hoarse and muffled under the blanket and sheet. “Gotta tell Art I can’t—”  
  
The cough that rips out of him is powerful. It’s dry and thick and rattles through _your_ chest. “Don’t worry about that, all right?” you say, too frantic even though you’re trying to be reassuring. You squeeze what might be Steve’s arm, rub it hard to press some kind of warmth into him, even though you’re just as cold. “Don’t—I gotta check you. That cough doesn’t...it don’t sound good.”  
  
Knowing your luck, and Steve’s, it probably isn’t good at all.

You can see the outline of Steve’s hand pull the blanket tighter around himself. “Piss off,” he croaks. “‘M freezing.”  
  
“Yeah,” you murmur, resist the urge to smack yourself. “Yeah, I know, but—scoot over, how ‘bout that one?”

A groan, but Steve moves further toward the wall. You kick your shoes off in two heavy thunks and slip under the covers, pull them over your head to keep out some of the cold. 

You almost hate the way being close sends a burst of warmth into your blood. You’ve slipped into his bed once or twice before, on desperately cold nights when not even an extra blanket or a couple pairs of socks layered up did the trick. You slept curled around him, but you managed not to think much of it. It was necessary, and it wasn’t long before you crawled back into your own bed, anyway.

As you take your position again, you realize Steve isn’t warm, or cold at all. He’s on _fire_ . He’s made himself a cocoon of thick, sickly heat.

“Jesus Christ,” you breathe. You feel him shiver at the press of your palm to the side of his neck, to his forehead, slick with sweat. Your stomach feels queasy all over again. “Stevie, you’re burning up.”

“No kiddin—” Steve coughs again, a roar of a thing. You know that particular sound. You _hate_ that sound. You tug him closer as it wracks through him, without really thinking about it. “No kidding.”  
  
Steve’s voice is tight and low, like his lungs are held in an iron grip. His breath sounds like a paper bag being crinkled up, and it’s all your fault. The guilt is burning through you as strongly as the fever is burning through Steve.

“I’m callin’ a doctor,” you say, with no room for him to argue. “We can afford it. You’re not stayin’ like this, Steve.”  
  
“Buck, don’t,” Steve croaks. “I’ll be fine, just go to work. Don’t worry about it.”  
  
“Like hell,” you snarl, but keep your voice down. You can feel your heart pounding. You wonder if Steve can, too. It’s beating up a storm. “You want me to go? Fine. Only if you let a doctor come check you. Let me make the damn call, Steve. Don’t fight me on this.”  
  
He must really feel awful, because right after that, he agrees.

-

You get a doctor to show up in about two hours. You realize then, that it’s six-thirty in the morning. You have about three hours until your shift starts, and even though you’ve been on rough waters, you’ll have to let the foreman know you can’t come in. If that costs you your position, you don’t know what you’ll do.

$115 is a lot of money, but it won’t last forever.

You boil water. You force coffee down your gullet and make Steve do the same, make him pull his head out from his cocoon to get something warm into his body, loosen up the tightness in his chest. You get him a refill when he asks for it, and he looks…

Well, he doesn’t look good, but he doesn’t look as bad. Your hands are itching to get some Aspirin into him, but the cabinet is bone dry. Same for chest rub. Steve ran out these last couple weeks, didn’t restock since he thought he didn’t need it.

Once the doctor finally gets his sorry ass to the door, you’ll need to grab what Steve needs. Something is telling you to stick around, and you don’t just ignore your gut. You can’t. Especially where Steve is concerned. You can practically taste it in the air before he causes some kind of ruckus, when he’s about to get ill. Last night, you were too drunk to see it.

“You get cold last night, Buck?” Steve asks, and your chest feels hollow. “Draft must’ve got in the bedroom.”

You’re sat on your own bed, knees up, still in your clothes from last night, your cup of coffee pumping its last dregs of heat into your body. You barely look at Steve, his sweat-darkened hair, the shadows under his eyes because all you can think is, _my fault._  
  
“Must’ve,” you echo, and take a gulp of coffee, half aware of the migraine sharpening behind your right eye.

-

When the doctor shows up, he says Steve has pneumonia. 

He says it must have been sitting in him for a few days, waiting to strike. Steve says his lymph glands were swollen for a couple of days, but he ignored it. You almost burst out, _why didn’t you tell me, asshole?_ but you just listen, feel guilt like a physical weight on your shoulders.

So, Steve really didn’t feel well enough to go out, and you gave him shit for it. God. If anyone’s the asshole, it’s you.

You feel like it’s always you.

-

The doctor lingers for a few minutes. Long enough for you to pester him, and long enough for you to slip out and get what’s needed. Aspirin, chest rub, throat lozenges. You grab those asthma cigarettes you always see, the ones Steve refuses to smoke. Maybe he’ll try them if you keep bugging him about it. You’ll figure out food later on. You have enough to eat for breakfast, if Steve can stomach it. _Breakfast_. You’ve only just become aware of the emptiness in your stomach, and of how you must look, edgy and sleepless, in messy clothes, hands all shaky. You feel the grime of last night sticking to you like molasses.

When you come back home, freezing all over again, you bump into the doctor in the hallway, but he only tips his hat and says, _Mr. Barnes_ , obviously not interested in you grilling him again.

You get inside. Steve’s on the couch now. It’s not as cold inside anymore, thank Christ, but even as the heating rattles on, it’s not much of a relief. “Čačo _dinlo_ ,” you say pointedly, instead of hello. “You should be in bed. What the hell are you doing?”  
  
“Mind your business, huh, Mrs. Rogers?” Steve says, scratchy. Coughs into his sleeve. He has the spare blanket from the closet, and he’s wearing…

Steve doesn’t own anything green, which means he’s wearing your sweater.  
  
Okay, yeah, the two of you share clothes more often than not since it’s cheaper and easier, and you’re sure that if you had a brother instead of a Becca, you’d be sharing more clothes than usual, but that’s _yours_. It’s a couple of years old, and you wear it pretty often. He has other options to choose from, why that? Was it the first thing he saw and just grabbed it ‘cause he was cold? 

You try not to think about it.

“So damn stubborn,” you say, set the bags on the coffee table you two lifted from an alley a couple days back. “Couldn’t stay in bed if you had a gun held to your head. Move your legs.”  
  
You plop down beside him. Hear the familiar scratch of his pencil. “The artist never really sleeps, huh?” you ask.

Steve smiles at that, the corner of his mouth turning up. He still looks like he’s been through the wringer, bright with fever, but the thing is, he’s used to it. To the point that he can just try to ignore it for a while, and occasionally succeed. “Neither does money,” he says, and flicks his eyes up at you. “You forget that ‘cause you got a wad of it in your sock drawer now?”

You chuckle despite yourself. “Hey, some of that’s supposed to be saved up, you know,” you say. “ _But_ I play my cards right—,” Steve groans aloud at that. “We’ll get our hands on a lot more.”  
  
“I hope your poker’s better than your jokes,” Steve says.

You nudge his knee. “You already know it is, sore loser that you are.”  
  
“Sore winner’s worse.”  
  
“Hey, I can’t help it.” You shrug. “And Eddie kept calling me Lucky Bucky last night, so that didn’t help much for my big head.”  
  
Steve laughs at that, coughs out _‘Jesus’_ , before he catches some of his breath. “Ugh, that’s awful, he’s worse than you,” he says, and strangely, the last of the tension between the two of you has dissipated, ebbed away. “Say, now that you aren’t throwing your guts up, tell me about the game. I got nowhere to be, and you ain’t leaving for a while, are you?”  
  
You don’t want to leave at all. “Yeah,” you say, eyes on the clock. A quarter to eight. You have plenty of time to decide. You reach for the bag and hand it to Steve. “Get started on something in here, and I’ll tell you.”

-

You tell Steve about the poker game, how it went on and on until it was down to you, John, and Eddie, and then you tell him about seeing _Love on The Run_. You thought it was a real stinker, and so did Marianne, but you sat through it anyway, since it was too cold for much else.

“She get all snippy because you were running your mouth during the movie?” Steve asks, looking a little less weak with the Aspirin in his system, breathing easier with the chest rub. The cigarettes remain untouched.

“Nah,” you say. “She got shushed more than I did, and that only made it worse. Kept cracking up, both of us.”  
  
You pick at a thread on your coat. Ma would kill you if you pulled the thread out. You’ll snip it later. Pop’s coat’s lasted this long. “I think I’m gonna call it quits with her.”

Steve looks at you like you’ve grown a second head. “What?” he asks, wheezy and thin, cracking a little like it used to when he was a kid. “Buck, I thought you were crazy about her. What happened?”  
  
That’s the thing, you’re not sure. “I guess it’s either throw in the towel or go steady.” You shrug, and look over at Steve. “And I don’t think I’m going steady.”  
  
Steve rolls his eyes, gets back to his commission. “That’s crazy talk.”  
  
“You don’t even like her!” You raise your arms, flop them back down hard. “Why do you even care?”  
  
That time, Steve really looks at you like you’ve lost it. “ _‘Cause_ if some girl’s makin’ you think about something more, I’m not getting in the way, you don’t have to choose between the two of us, Bucky. It don’t work like that. If you want to put a ring on her finger one day—”  
  
“ _God_ , Steve.” You pinch the bridge of your nose. “Don’t say things like that.”  
  
“Then go ahead,” Steve finishes simply.  
  
“For the love of—I ain’t going steady, and I ain’t getting married,” you blurt out, swipe your hand at the air like you can physically bat the idea away. “Not now. Not ever.”

For a moment, the air is heavy. Thick. Like you’ve said something you shouldn’t, but then Steve gives a throaty chuckle.

“Yeah, me neither,” he says. “Dames aren’t really lining up to talk to me.”

“Their loss,” you say, and don’t care. Maybe there’s still some whiskey left in your system. “You’re a catch, Steve. Honest. Anyone with eyes can see that. You’ll find someone, some kind of spitfire dame like you, and you’ll treat each other right.”

You expect a joke. You expect _you calling me a girl or something, Barnes?_ but it doesn’t come. He just gives you something like a smile, but he’s not looking up. He kicks you a little. “You should get to work,” he says, and you can’t tell if he’s concentrated on what he’s doing, or lost in his thoughts.  
  
“I can miss a day,” you say. “I’ll think of something to say.”  
  
An exasperated sound. Steve shuts his eyes for a second, shakes his head. “No, Bucky, you’ve done enough as it is,” he says. “I can’t be the thing that leaves your job up in the air.”

You stay home, Steve’ll drill into you about it all day. You leave, you’ll drill into _yourself_ about it all day. But the truth is, Steve ain’t helpless. Not in the slightest. He’s spent plenty of time on his own while he was sick, as a kid and in the months you’ve been living together.

You just don’t want to leave him.  
  
You rub your hands over your face, groan low in your chest. You’re hungover, sure, but you’ve worked through worse. Sore limbs and colds and more. “Look,” you say, flop your hands down. “You need me for something, I don’t care what, you call and I’ll get back here as fast as I can. Got it?”  
  
“Yeah, got it,” Steve says, looking far too satisfied with himself. He nudges you again. “Now get outta here.”

-

You work without a call from Steve. You don’t know if that’s a good thing or not. 

Eddie isn’t there. Maybe he was too plastered to get out of bed. That almost makes you relieved you came. You have to do twice the work, and get paid extra for it. 

Covered in the grime of the day, your cap wet with snow and hands dirty and crusted with blood from your dry knuckles and wrists, you go to the grocer. The one near the docks is cheaper. You get what you don’t mind eating, what Steve don’t mind eating, and make your way home.  
  
Cleaning the muck off of you shouldn’t feel so good, but it does. In a lukewarm bath, you scrub your skin raw, rub the dirt from under your nails, wash your hair twice. By the time you’re out, Steve is conked out on the couch. Finally. Maybe he’ll actually get some shut eye. And maybe the apartment will actually warm up a bit once you get some food going.  
  
-

Even though you’re tired of chipped beef on toast, you’re kind of relieved to put something into your stomach. You don’t think about getting out tonight, not by a longshot. Besides, it seems that whenever you’re on the verge of making progress on something like moving forward, you end up right back where you started.

If four years have gone by without you shaking this off, are you ever going to be able to? Are you ever going to be able to look at Steve and not feel the familiar knot of guilt in your chest? If you can’t remember the name of the last girl you were with, but can recognize Steve by his footsteps, even on the street, doesn’t that mean you won’t make it with anyone else?  
  
Sometimes, you feel like your secrets are going to burn you up from the inside out, just like the fevers that try to burn Steve up, no matter how much they’re staved off.

-

Steve doesn’t wake up to eat, doesn’t wake up to take any meds. When you check his forehead, the side of his neck, he’s gone feverish again, that flush back in his face, the dry paleness of his mouth. Like he’s not getting enough air.

You rest your hand in the center of his chest, like a five point star. You can feel the rattle of his breath against your palm, feel the heat of his skin, even through the stolen sweater. His lashes are dark against his face. Steve’s a light sleeper, unlike you. He would have been woken up by you walking into the room.

“Hey,” you say quietly, avoid the guilt that tries to settle in as you slip your hand up to his upper arm. Yeah, Steve needs to rest, but he also needs other things to function if he’s sick. “Come on, Steve. You gotta get something in your stomach.”  
  
He turns around. You’re not sure if he hears you, and is avoiding you, or if he’s so lost in the throes of fever that his sleep is all but impenetrable. It’s happened before.

You’re hoping for the former of the two.

-

You spend the entire evening in the quiet. It starts snowing again around nine o’clock, and it sticks fast. It grows heavier an heavier, bringing in an ugly draft with it despite the radiator. You cover up the windows as best as you can.

You make a dent in a book you bought months ago but never touched, the radio faint in your ears until you can’t listen anymore, but by the time you crawl into bed, mouth tasting of toothpaste, you feel restless. 

Even though you have a full belly, a day’s wages and more hidden away now, you don’t feel any less stressed. Any less stretched thin. You keep glancing over to Steve, watching the rise and fall of his shoulders. Listening to the whistle and crackle of his breath.

You left two Aspirin and a glass of water by his bed hours ago. They’re still there, untouched. The cigarettes are unopened. You saw the pack of lozenges open, saw a few wrappers in the trash, but nothing else.

See, Steve has a problem admitting when he doesn’t feel well. And for a guy who’s sick as often as he is, that’s not such a good thing. For all parties involved. Sarah used to get tight-lipped and huffy about it, muttering, just like Steve does, but the difference between Steve and his ma is that she had _sense_. She was stubborn, sure, but not hard-headed like Steve is.

You try not to think about that as you stare out the open door, at the snow falling fast and heavy. It’s going to get even colder this week, no denying that.

Maybe you’re a little edgy from yesterday, but you can’t help it. You can’t help it. You tell yourself this as you rip the sheet and blanket from your body, slip into Steve’s bed. It doesn’t mean anything. You and Steve pushed your beds together during the freezing first month you moved in to keep warm. Besides, weren’t you in his bed this morning, too?  
  
He’s facing away from you again, and when you slip your arm around his waist, get as comfortable as you can manage, the squeeze isn’t so bad. It’s barely a squeeze at all. Steve is a little shrimp, and aside from your height advantage, you’re pretty slim yourself. Because of that, your bodies fit together easily.

You hate the way the thought of that makes you feel. You hate the way the itch under your skin settles when you feel Steve tangle your legs with his own.

“Steve,” you try one last time, voice muffled by your face being half smashed into the pillow.

No response, but then a hum, low and unbothered.

“You okay?”  
  
“Fine.” Steve’s voice is barely there, but you think that’s because he’s been knocked out for so long. You know how he sounds if his lungs are getting bad. Well, worse. “Jus’ stay put.”  
  
He never asks you to stay. Not point blank. You both just sort of...come to an agreement without really saying anything. 

But yeah, you can do that. Stay put. You always do.

-

Your body’s internal clock doesn’t allow you to oversleep. So, it’s still dark when you wake up, even though you have a feeling it’s a little after six. Your body is tight and uncomfortable, and you’re about to stretch, about to ease the stiffness from your body before you realize it’s another stiffness entirely.

Even heavy with sleep, your stomach drops hard. You feel like the bed has been pulled right out from under you. Your arm is still wrapped around Steve, the rest of you pressed up behind him, dick hard against the small of his back.

_Jesus goddamn Roosevelt Christ, is there ever a dull moment?_

You wish you were able to panic, but your breath is slow, your heart steady when it shouldn’t be. This is bad. God, this is...what the hell are you still doing here?  
  
Slowly, you slip your arm away from Steve’s middle. Turning onto your other side leaves you aching. Leaves prickles of something painful sparking in your abdomen. You’re about to pull the covers back, but a skinny arm snakes its way around your waist and tugs you close again. The line of Steve’s body is against the length of your body. He slips his leg between yours, links your ankles together.

His hand is splayed out against your stomach, breath hot and surprisingly quiet against the nape of your neck.

Predictably, none of it helps your situation. In fact, it worsens it, but at least you’re not pressing up against him anymore. You wonder what would happen if he noticed now. If his hand crept too low. You wonder what you would do if your positions were switched. If it was Steve pressing thick and hot against your back. Would you find a way to leave? Would you say nothing?  
  
Your heart rattles against your ribs. You have to get up. You have to get up regardless, you tell yourself, but you can’t move. You feel frozen in place, even with your blood turning molten in your veins.

“I swear to God,” you mutter to no one, low enough that even you can barely hear it. “You’re out for blood, Rogers.”

And then you pull yourself from the bed.

-

Holed up in the bathroom. you jerk yourself off hard and fast, biting into the fist of your free hand as you come in hot ropes over your fingers. With your eyes closed, you can pretend it’s not your hand at all.

-

You leave a note. Underlined, telling Steve to actually keep an eye on himself. You ask Mrs. Gillespie from upstairs to check on him once or twice, since you won’t be back until the evening.

As you work, your thoughts are a mess. Thick and slow, even though your body does what it’s supposed to. The mundaneness of it all helps. The cold helps. Cuts through some of the fog.

You smoke half a pack of cigarettes. You try not to think about this morning. You turn down Don and Arthur’s offer of a beer. When Eddie appears and asks if you’re coming to Odie’s again, you say no. And then you change that answer. You say you’ll come by on Saturday, and he grins, says he’ll see you there.

It’s not a good idea, but you’ve had a taste, and you don’t know how to shake it. You know you should be careful, but when have you ever been careful?

-

When his coughing doesn’t let up, Steve huffs and chokes out, “ _Fine_ , you win,” and opens the asthma cigarettes. “Where’d you put your matches?”  
  
You snatch the pack from your coat, tucked next to your pack of Luckies. “Catch,” you say and toss them over. You laugh when they hit Steve square in the forehead, when he hisses _dick_ under his breath. “Guess I’m not the next pitcher for the Dodgers, huh?”

“God, no,” Steve says, smiles wryly. “Keep away. I don’t need you messing everything up. We’ve had it bad as it is.”

You sink back onto the sofa. Watch Steve pop the cigarette between his lips. “Want a light?” you ask, half-joking. “I don’t need your butterfingers dropping a match and setting the place on fire.”  
  
“Yeah, yeah, go ahead,” Steve says. You light the match for him and he leans forward, same as anyone else would. You cup your hand around the flame until it catches, then shake it out. Grab your empty ashtray from the windowsill.

Steve chokes, splutters out a cloud of smoke. “Christ,” he says hoarsely. Eyes watering. “Jesus, that’s awful.”  
  
“Hey, quit whining and smoke,” you say, drop the ashtray on the coffee table with a clink. “You have to take it slow. Don’t just pull it all in as fast as you can.”

Steve catches his breath for the most part, takes another puff. Slower this time. You watch the burning ember of the cigarette, try to consider the somewhat off smell rather than the way Steve’s lips curl around the length of it. The way his fingers splayed against your stomach this morning. 

“Guess you’d know,” Steve says. “I don’t know how your Ma never caught you when you first started.”

“Never caught me? Pfft.” you echo. “She knew in a goddamn second. She cornered me about it, grabbed the smoke outta my hand and said, next time _ask_ instead of stealing from your mother.”

Steve arches a brow at that. He’s sitting cross-legged on the couch, facing you, half listening to whatever serial is on tonight. He won’t get in bed unless he has to, but he’s been that way as long as you can remember. The more a doctor or his ma or you told him to stay put, the more eager he was to jump out of his own skin. “So, you asked, I guess,” Steve says. “What’d she say?”  
  
You pin him with a look. “When pigs fly,” you answer. “So, I bought my own pack after I started working at the grocer’s a few years back. She saw about a week later and didn’t say nothing.”  
  
A hum. “That ain’t like her,” Steve says.  
  
“Oh, but it is,” you say. “That’s Ma for ‘you made your bed, you can lie in it if you want to.’”

You’ve made too many beds, you think. You’re turning your lungs to husks and turning your heart to one, too. One’ll give out soon, you just aren’t sure which it is.

-

That night, you resist the urge to slip into Steve’s bed. As much as you want to, you don’t. But a few days later, just as December creeps in, it gets so cold that even the radiator does jackall, and you have to shove your beds together. 

It’s more comfortable than you’d like to admit, even though you stick to your side of the bed these days, avoid all touches aside from a few not-so-accidental bumps of your ankle against Steve’s, or your hand resting close to his body when you’re trying to get to sleep.

It’s wishful thinking, but you think Steve doesn’t mind it. You’re both feeling a little lonesome lately. You’ve been avoiding Marianne like the plague, and Steve never went on the date with Ruth. He doesn’t look up for new company, though, and you feel about the same.

So, maybe this isn’t so bad. 

Maybe it’s because the two of you have been so close for so long you don’t know anything else, don’t find certain things off when you should. Any other fella would balk at the idea of sharing a bed with his pal unless he absolutely had to. Wouldn’t consider living with him long-term. 

Anyone else would have found a steady girl by now, but you’re not leaving Red Hook anytime soon. You doubt Steve is, either. You wish the reason for that wasn’t loneliness, or the inability to afford an apartment without splitting the rent. 

You wish, for both of you, that it was a different reason entirely. A happier one, maybe.

-

You think that Steve is on his way to getting better, but he gets it in his head that he should prove that fact by going out. You tag along, but you end up staying out later than expected. The two of you walk around for ages. You breathe in the cold air, watch snowflakes fall. It looks nice now, sure, but it’ll all turn to piles of grey slush soon enough.

“You hear there’s a skating rink in Rockefeller Center now?” Steve says. His nose is red with cold. And it’s even getting a little too nippy for you. You fit your scarf up over your mouth and nose as the wind picks up, blows snow in your eyes. “Maybe we’ll go one of these days.”  
  
“When I’m not turning to a damn ice cube, sure,” you grumble. Tug your cap lower. “Becks was talking about it anyway. Only thing I can get outta her that’s not Scott Proctor. Was I this moony over anyone before?”  
  
Steve seems to think you’ve got the right idea, and tugs his scarf tighter. He grabs the crook of your arm, tugs you into the restaurant he was telling you about, some Italian place you’ve never been to. You feel a burst of warmth ruffle through you as you take your hat off.

“A few years ago, I just about knocked your head off when you kept talking about Nancy Miller,” Steve says. “Jesus, I couldn’t stand her.”  
  
“You don’t seem to like any of my girls, Rogers.” You nudge his ribs. His eyes are bright, hair windblown, bangs covering his forehead. There’s a little skip somewhere below your stomach. “Just for that, I ain’t giving your wife a break the day you find one.”

-

Your stomachs are full and you both feel a little better than before, since you’ve been cooped up inside for so long, but the walk home is even colder than before. The snowflakes have thickened and are falling heavier, blowing in the wind and turning Coffey Street to something like the inside of a snowglobe.

“You know something?” you shout over the howl of wind, squint against it and feel your eyes tear. You really need to get home, get Steve out of the cold before it gets to him.“What?” Steve’s voice is muffled, mouth hidden behind his scarf.  
  
“I _said_ , you know something!”

“ _What_?” Steve shouts. You groan. It’s really not important. You’ve already forgotten it.

-

When you get inside, you feel a little winded. Your face is numb, feet cold in your boots. You immediately move for the cabinet. Get a pot for water to boil. You could use something hot to drink.  
  
Steve is winded, too, you notice. He says nothing, but you notice. He’s breathing like he’s ran all the way home rather than walked.

Even with another cigarette, he doesn’t stop breathing that way, too heavy and too fast.

-

It’s cold enough that frost has found its way onto the inside of the windows, and covering them up doesn’t help. Sealing up the drafts doesn’t help. You’re wearing two pairs of socks, and a sweater over your pajama shirt when you slide into bed. Steve has done the same. Between that and the shared warmth of your bodies, he should be fine.  
  
You tell yourself this over and over again even though he keeps coughing, even though his breath remains short. Even though there’s a knot of worry deep in your chest, hard enough to ache.

“Steve?” you ask for the second time that night. “Sure you’re alright?”

Steve shrugs, sat up against his pillow. Shakes his head. “It’ll pass,” he says, same as he did earlier. “Always does.”

You’re worrying at your lower lip. It feels raw and sensitive when you probe your tongue over it. “Maybe we should go to the hospital.”  
  
“We can’t afford it,” Steve says, voice low and tight. “Don’t mention the money, because that’s not what—I just can’t, Buck.”  
  
Somehow, you get the message loud and clear.

“What are you so scared of?” you ask, blunt, but not biting. 

Steve turns to look at you, but then he’s looking away just as quickly, finding something interesting in the ridges of his quilt. You expect him to get pissy, but he doesn’t. He goes quiet, which means you’re close to getting an answer. Steve only ever goes silent when he’s wrong, or actually, properly upset.

“Buck, I spent so much time with Ma at Bellevue,” he says quietly, doesn’t really raise his eyes to you, but rather near you. Somewhere near your shoulder. “And I can’t help thinking about it. Can’t help wondering.”

You’ve considered it. Swallowed down your worries of Steve coughing up a mouthful of blood one day. You about lost your mind when you saw some of it in a tissue in the trash, even though you knew that happened during his worse coughing fits, but Steve saying it out loud now, Steve saying he’s thought about it too, makes you dizzy.

“Steve,” you say seriously. Your hand reaches out and grabs his wrist before you can stop it. “You’re okay. Look, if you had it, we would’ve known a long time ago, right? The doctor would’ve been able to tell when he came by, anyway.”  
  
Steve huffs at that, and leans his head back. He’s smiling, but there’s nothing behind it. It doesn’t reach his eyes. Why would it? 

“They didn’t know ma had it till it was too late. She was a _nurse_ , Bucky, and everyone told her it was crazy talk even though it was everywhere, even though she worked the ward, knew the symptoms,” he says. “Once the doctor finally listened, that was it. Everybody knew she was done for.”  
  
You can’t argue with him. You know he’s right for wondering, but the thought that he might be right is a horrible one.

It can’t be that that’s what it is. Steve’s gotten through plenty—scarlet fever and flus that lasted weeks, bronchitis and countless bouts of pneumonia. TB can’t be the thing to knock him down for good. 

“I know,” you say, and turn onto your stomach, force him to look at you as you give his wrist a squeeze. “I _know_ , but we’ve both been in that ward. We’ve both seen what it looks like on people, and I ain’t trying to be a good friend when I say I don’t think you got it. I think this is just getting you down, and that’s all there is to it.”  
  
“Will you just _listen_ ?” Steve snaps, eyes bright with anger, with fear, though he’d never admit it. “What if I end up being right? What are you gonna do, keep living here?”  
  
“You don’t have TB,” you press. “And if it turns out you do, I ain’t skipping town on you. I’ll volunteer at the damn ward if that’s the case. You’re not going it alone. I think Sarah’d, I dunno, have a piano dropped on my head like Laurel and Hardy if I did.”  
  
“You’re an idiot,” Steve says, face softening a little. “you know, Buck, sometimes I wonder—”

He shuts up quickly then, and your brows knit together. “Wonder what?” you ask, something rising fast in your chest, even as Steve shrugs.

“Nothing,” he says, looking both better and worse than before. “Don’t worry about it.”  
  
Yeah, like hell. Your mind’s gonna run all night, now. You try not to show that though, so you roll your eyes and turn onto your side, tug the blanket up past your shoulders, quietly grateful for the closeness of Steve’s body, the rise and fall of his breath. “Get some sleep, why don’t ya?” you say, watch the room turn dark with the soft click of Steve shutting the lamp off. “Nature’s cure-all, they say.”

You hear Steve go _pfft_. “Who said that, huh?” he asks, nudges his foot against the back of your knee.

“Friend of a friend,” you say, half aware of the warmth spreading up from your belly, trying to loosen the tension in your upper body. It doesn’t budge. “Don’t worry about it.”  
  
You don’t fall asleep for a while, since you’re listening to Steve’s breaths, making sure they don’t stutter or stop completely.

-

The thing about you is that you can sleep through anything, but another is that you have a way of knowing something bad is stirring, and you’re almost always right.  
  
So, when you jolt awake to Steve coughing, you think that it might be nothing, but there’s...there’s something off about his breathing. 

It’s wheezier. Shorter. You turn around, find him sitting at the edge of the bed, back to you, shoulders rising and falling fast, shaking as they go down.

“Steve?” you rasp, suddenly alert. You sit up and move closer. For a second, you think he’s crying, considering the way his body is tensed up. “What the hell?”

He shakes his head. He has the sheets in a white-knuckled grip. You turn him around fast, maybe too roughly, but you can’t bring yourself to care.

“Jesus Christ,” you breathe out. pulse picking up. Even in the dark, he’s too pale. You click the lamp on, take both his shoulders. You try to make it feel steadying, but your head is spinning. Steve’s skin is hot and slick with sweat. His lips are almost grey, eyes wide. “Steve, I gotta get you to a hospital.”

“No,” he grits out, low and thin, like it hurts to speak. Maybe it does. “Weather’s too—we have to wait it out. We gotta wait til morning.

“Like hell,” you say. God, it’s snowing so badly. There’s no way to get a taxi, no way to get to the train without it being a hassle. “Have you looked in the mirror? You look—”  
  
_You look dead already_ , you want to say, but thankfully Steve cuts you off. “I can _wait_ , Buck,” he croaks, his throat bobs as he swallows an excuse for a breath. “Did it before. I made it out just fine.”  
  
You know about the fluid that creeps into his lungs. It’s not like he’s never told you, but _you’ve never seen it happening_. “Yeah.” Your voice is quiet, lost in your throat. You feel like you’re not getting enough air yourself. Like all the blood’s drained out of your head. “I know. I know that, but I’m not a nurse, Steve.”  
  
There’s a strange moment of silence. The street has none of its usual racket. All you can hear is Steve’s wheezing, your own heaving breaths mingling with the sound. His eyes are a little bloodshot. 

You put one hand against his chest, rising and falling rapidly. “Look at me,” you say, try to wrangle in some of your senses. Your other hand comes to the back of his neck, gone feverish again. If your hands weren’t so busy, they’d be shaking. “You’re gonna breathe with me, and then we’re figuring this out. You’re gonna be fine, you hear me?”  
  
You realize this is the first time Steve has had an actual emergency since Sarah passed. _Come on_ , you think, glancing up a little foolishly, not really sure if you’ll get an answer, _cut us some slack here_.

-

It’s one of the longest nights of your life.

You both try to ignore the reality of things going wrong, and just take it a minute at a time. Steve’s chest hurts, so he takes Aspirin. His breathing gets too fast, since his lungs are tight, and he does, even though he refuses to admit it, panic a few times. It’s nothing you can’t get through, but when he starts throwing up, there’s a moment where he loses his breath entirely, and it doesn’t come back.

There’s a moment when there’s no sound coming out of him, chest stuttering as his lips turn blue. 

Something inside of you snaps, all composure gone, and you shake him hard, gripping his arms hard enough to bruise when _he still can’t breathe in._

Is he choking? No, he’s not. You’d hear it if he was choking, hear him struggling to breathe, and you’d know what to do, but now, you don’t know what to do. You have no goddamn clue.

You shout his name, loud enough that the neighbors below you thump hard on their ceiling, and it’s jarring enough for Steve to pull in a breath, deep and fast, like he’s been punched. He coughs and splutters, looks just as surprised as you when he doesn’t drop dead on the spot.

“Do that again,” you croak, throat thick. “And I’ll strangle you myself.”

Truth is, you don’t remember much after that. 

You know you both bundle up despite everything. It’s barely light outside, but it’s six o’clock, and you get to the hospital with some money haphazardly stuffed in your wallet as you spare Steve glances in the back of a taxi. You must get there fast, because the fare isn’t that high.

But by eight-thirty, Steve is seeing a doctor. And you’ve been left sitting in the waiting room all morning, since they don’t believe you when you say you’re family, and they don’t seem to care when you keep insisting to be let in.

It’s a load of shit, in your opinion. For all intents and purposes, you’re all he has, but that doesn’t seem to matter here.

The doctor, a spindly man who looks like he’s been here since the goddamn beginning of time, steps out of Steve’s room just as a nurse slips in, and you all but pounce on him. “Were you waiting for someone, son?” he asks patiently, taking a single step back.

You can’t stand doctors or hospitals, and you’ve been keeping Steve from kicking the bucket all night. Your patience has run for the hills. “Rogers. I’m waiting for Rogers,” you force out, nails pressing dents into your palms as you clench your fists. Whether it’s anger or fear, you aren’t sure. “It’s—what’s going on with him?”  
  
Your ears are ringing as he explains, trying to talk you down like you’re some kind of wild thing and maybe you are, maybe you’re on the verge of making a scene, but you don’t care anymore. You’ve had one hell of a night, and no one can blame you for being a little less than respectful.

The pneumonia never quite left Steve’s system. They’ve took samples, and it’s not TB, _thank the fucking lord above_ , just a nasty case of the usual due to the cold, due to Steve not keeping a closer eye on himself. And apparently, it would be in Steve’s best interest if he spent a night or two in the hospital.

You’ll manage. You’ll pay for a bed, and you won’t give Steve the chance to tear you a new one about it. If it’s what he needs, it’s what he needs.

“Then send me the bill,” you say in the end. “He doesn’t need to know about it.”  
  
“Who are you to him?” the doctor asks.

“We’re.” You swallow and hope that Steve can’t hear you through the shut door. “We’re friends, but I’m all he’s got. No siblings, no cousins, no other family. His ma died in February.”

“If you’d said that before, the nurse would have let you in,” the doctor says, and gives you a look, somewhere between pity and resignation. He probably knows that if you’re turned away again, you’ll get rowdy. “He’ll be taken to a room soon. You can see him, then.”  
  
-

Steve’s room is a shared one, separated by a curtain from a woman who alternates between snoring up a storm and hacking loud enough to make the nurses peek in at her.  
  
You hate the way he looks in the bed, so damn small. Hate the pale, drawn look to his face and the shadows beneath his eyes. You sit in a chair close to the bed, arms crossed over the edge of it, close to Steve’s arm. You watch the cannula dug into his hand, the tube feeding him antibiotics. Maybe a couple of days of that will do the trick. Apparently, he’s got a different sort of pneumonia this time, and this’ll fix it. Get him back on his feet.

He hasn’t been asleep for long, but God knows he needs it. December has been a nightmare for him. Your fingers itch to touch him, but you don’t want to wake him up. Hell, you can’t look him in the eye without seeing the fear in his face as his breath fizzled out, as his lips turned blue.

You must doze off yourself, because you wake with your hand over his and a crick in your neck. According to the clock, it’s a quarter to eleven.

_A quarter to eleven._

God, no, no, _no_ , if you get canned for this...if you get canned for being late or not showing up at all— which is worse? 

What the hell are you supposed to do?  
  
Showing up late is better than not showing up at all. Your heart pounds hard. You can’t lose your job. If Steve is going to be in the hospital, if there’s the rent and medicine and—

You scoot away and shove your arms in your coat, tug your hat on, and your legs freeze in place when you watch Steve’s head turn to the spot where you were. His fingers twitch, but he won’t be waking up any time soon.

You look left, and you look right, and then you move close again. 

You tell yourself you’re checking for a fever when you rest your hand on his forehead, when you smooth his hair back, but you know you’re not fooling anyone when you press your lips to his temple and breathe him in—breathe in the sourness of last night and mineral spirits and the sharp, familiar smell of a hospital.  
  
It doesn’t help steady you. It makes you feel shaky and out of sorts, but you still peel out of the room, telling a nurse to tell Steve you’ll be back later on. The cold air wakes you up as you run, skidding on the grey, slushy snow, on the salt-sprinkled sidewalks. You only go home to pull on your coveralls, and then you’re right back outside again, running as fast as you can, even though the day is crawling on.

-

By the time you reach the docks, you’re breathless and shaking like a leaf. You bump into Don, who tells you the foreman has smoke coming out his ears about your absence, so you puff out _well, I’m here now, ain’t I?_ because you think you must have lost your brain on the run over.

Somehow, somehow, you talk your way out of it. It’s a lie for the most part, but the story itself is true. The only change is that you say it’s Becca in the hospital, not Steve, since everyone knew you had a younger sister, and when you say you thought she was leaving for good last night, it works like a charm. For the most part, at least.

“I know it was an emergency, Barnes, but try to call in next time,” the foreman says. “That’s the only reason I’m givin’ you a strike. Two more mistakes, and you’re outta here. Got it?”  
  
Heart in your throat, you say _yes sir_ , and you work overtime. You work until your back feels like it might snap like a twig. 

It’s dark and cold by the time you walk home. shivering through your coveralls. You go inside and clean yourself up. You gather a bag of Steve’s things. His charcoals and sketchpad, his clothes. You slip your deck of cards into your coat pocket with your cigarettes, and you go right back out.

Something’s gonna go wrong at the docks, you can feel it. You know it in your bones, and your mind wanders to other things you might know how to do just in case of that. You think about it, long and hard, as you board the train.

-

When you get back, Steve is still asleep and visiting hours are all but over, but a nurse lets you in to drop off Steve’s bag. You leave a note on top of it, promise you’ll get back as soon as you can. You know Steve’s in good hands, but you feel wrong not sticking around. You feel sick with it.

The hospital is eerily quiet, even with the doctors and nurses milling around. Everything about it gives you the creeps. It always has, and you’ve never known why.

You have one, single memory of your father, and even though it’s hazy, it’s there. You remember sitting in a waiting room with him, after they wheeled Ma away with her big belly to bring Rebecca into the world, and you remember fidgeting and fidgeting and fidgeting, getting antsy when the doctors and nurses spoke to you, so you and your Pop went out into the hot July heat and into the park across the street. You think he might have had a not-so-deep voice, and in your memories now, he looks younger than you thought he was at the time. He held your hand while you jumped up on ledges and benches and he said, _“You know, I don’t like hospitals either, pal. They give me the creeps. So, thanks for getting me outta there.”_

You remember nothing else. Of course you don’t. He was dead and buried a week later.

-

There’s a chapel in the hospital.

You haven’t been to church in so long, and some foolish part of you thinks, _maybe that’s why you’re being dealt so many bad hands_.

That can’t be it, though. You know that Steve would have gotten sick whether you parked your ass in a pew or not. You would have been late for work either way. You would have left the window open either way.

You can still feel the smoothness of Steve’s skin against your lips, as deeply as you feel the memory of his arm around you, the tightness in your body and the hot guilt in your throat when you tented against his back.

Head ducked down, you look at your feet instead of the stained glass. Instead of the crucifix in the center of the wall. Your fingers are wet with holy water and sweat, and then tears when you run them over your face. You don’t know why you’re crying, since everything is falling back into place, slowly but surely, but you don’t think you’re gonna stop for a while.

The close, choking air in the chapel isn’t helping you, so you push out of the pew. You rub your face hard as a chill creeps up your spine, and you find Steve’s room again. Slip in silent, like a mouse. Walk heel-to-toe to his bed.

He’s awake, and the crazed part of you, afraid to be caught looking, considers bolting all over again, but your mind is falling back to the past. To a priest in Steve’s room, giving him his last rites, to Steve’s voice, thick with fever, calling for you as you ran out of the room. 

“Bucky?” Steve asks. He has the room to himself now, since that hag checked out in the afternoon. 

“There’s something I gotta tell you,” you croak instead of saying hello, sit down on the bed. “Steve, I—all of this, it’s my fault, pal, I—”  
  
“What?” Steve’s voice is weak, but he’s fuming. You can see it. “Jesus, Buck, don’t say that.”  
  
You gulp down a sob, eyes stinging hard. You’re shaking from head to toe. “Yeah, but it is. No, don’t sit up. Don’t.” 

Steve sits up anyway. Your voice is a wreck, and you move closer, because you just can’t stay away anymore. You can’t keep it in anymore. Your fingers twist in the front of his hospital gown. “I left the fucking window open. I left it open that night I came back from Odie’s and I—Steve, you wouldn’t even _be in here_ if I had my head screwed on straight. I fucked up. I fucked up and I almost lost you last night because of it, and I—I’m sorry. God, I’m so _sorry_.”

You feel drunk. Movements sloppy, head spinning, and Steve is the only solid thing in the room, still barely back on his feet, but here you are, sniveling all over him, head pressed against his rattling chest, like some goddamn sap. You can’t lose your head now, but the weight on your shoulders is cracking you in two. All you can think about is how close you came to losing him, how easily his blood could have been on your hands. 

Steve says something you can’t make out, hand coming to the back of your neck and squeezing in some attempt to steady you. It only makes you feel worse. He shouldn’t have to do this. Shouldn’t have to comfort you. Especially not now, but here he is. He’s always been more steady than you. Steve gets angry, too. He gets upset, too, but you always feel like you’re going to shake apart with it, unlike him. 

Anger, sadness, it binds to Steve’s bones or gets punched out of him when he’s getting beat on in some piss covered alley. Everything he feels makes him stronger. 

Everything you feel makes you weaker.

The sound that comes out of you is thick and wet, all in your nose. When you breathe out, it leaves your shoulders hitching. You pull away from Steve fast, rub at your eyes with your palms. It’s useless, though. Your tears are clinging to your lashes and making it harder to see. “Sorry,” you say again, a cough pushing its way out of you. “Sorry, pal, I...I dunno what’s goin’ on with me.”

“Bucky.”  
  
You raise your head, just barely, to look at him. “Yeah,” you mutter.

“Just get back over here,” Steve says tiredly, and he’s wound tight, too. You let him tug you in, and you try not to squeeze him too tight, your chin resting in the junction between his neck and his shoulder, fingers gripping at the fabric of the gown again. Someone lets out a shaky breath. You aren’t sure who it is, but feeling Steve, warm and alive against you, is like cool water running over a burn. A dishtowel of ice over a hot, throbbing bruise.

“I thought I was losing you last night,” you say, voice a little muffled against him. You shut your eyes tight over the image of him, breathless and blue in the face, and rub your hand over his back. “Thought you were gonna drop dead on me, kid.”  
  
Steve doesn’t give any reassurances. He just says. “Yeah,” and squeezes you closer with the little strength he’s gotten back. You can’t imagine how he must feel. A part of you doesn’t want to know. “Me too.”

-

Steve gives you dirty looks about you taking care of the hospital bill, and says he’ll pay you back. You know he will, no matter what you say, but you’re not worried about it. It’s not about the money. Money is just the only thing you can scrape out of you.

If you were able to give him your lungs and your heart instead, give him bones that didn’t ache or a spine that didn’t bend, you would have done it by now. Turned yourself to a pile of flesh and blood for him.

-

Steve surprises you by actually beginning to take care of himself, which means whatever the doctor told him, whatever Steve neglected to tell you about, scared the shit out of him. 

He sleeps more, eats right. Gets some color back into his face. You both get back to something like normality, and you realize the world has not stopped in its tracks. It still spins on, even though the axis of yours was on the verge of crumbling to dust.

-

“I don’t know what she likes anymore,” you’re grumbling as you walk through the ladies’ section of _Abraham & Straus_, eyes flickering over clothes in soft, dusty colors. “I know she’d hate all of this, though. You ever see her and Ma shopping together? _Jesus_. I wouldn’t be surprised if someone called the cops ‘cause of all their racket.”  
  
Steve laughs at that, because, well, he’s heard the two of them bickering plenty of times. Hell, the entire neighborhood has heard it, and it’s only getting worse the older Rebecca gets. “Then maybe don’t get her any clothes?” he says. “Plenty of other things girls like. Y’know, ‘cause I know better than anyone.”  
  
Maybe it’s not too normal, two fellas wandering around the women’s section of a store, but you don’t care too much. You’re a good enough talker, and it’s not like you could have brought Marianne along. You haven’t heard from her since you took her to the movie house.

“Watch this,” you say, and slip away just as Steve says, “Oh, come on!”

The girls have already spotted you, and the redhead is snickering at her friend, who has a curly bun of dark hair. “Hiya,” you say. “You think either of you ladies can help me out?”  
  
The brunette sputters a laugh. “I don’t think you’ll fit into any of the clothes down here,” she says. Her accent is smooth and a little clipped. Irish.

You grin. “Oh, no, sweetheart, I already bought my Sunday best,” you say. “I was thinkin’ I needed a girl to help me shop for my little sister. Ain’t like she’s gonna tell me what she likes. Just her friends and her mook of a boyfriend.”  
  
It works like a charm. Neither the redhead or her friend—who you find out are named Lorraine and Dot—want to punch you at all, since they figure out you really _are_ trying to find a decent Christmas present for your sister. You notice Dot and Steve talking a little, all dry humor and quick jabs, and he’s actually, properly _smiling_ at her.  
  
Lorraine says, “You said your sister’s a little rough and tough?” and snaps you out of your thoughts. 

“That’s her,” you say, and lay it on a little thick. “Someone had to teach her how to take care of herself.”

Lorraine grins at that. She really is a looker, all freckles and a lavender dress under her smart beige coat and hat. “Well, you seem like a pretty decent guy, keepin’ an eye on her like that,” she says. She puts a pair of deep green slacks over your arm, over the creamy blouse. “She might like these, if she puts up a fight about a dress. Let her feel like Katharine Hepburn for a little while.”

Rebecca loves Katharine Hepburn. You know that better than anyone. She made you sit through _Little Women_ five times when it came out, and at one point, you stopped hating it so badly, realized how much Jo reminded you of Becca.  
  
“You know what, Lorraine? You’re a dream,” you say. “Thanks a lot.”  
  
That’s when you notice the ring on her finger. “Oh, Christ,” you say. “Didn’t see that. Your fella ain’t around, is he?”  
  
She laughs at that. “Yeah, right behind you.” You almost, _almost_ look. “I don’t think you mean no harm. Besides,” she leans in close. “I think Dot really likes your friend.”  
  
Steve and Dot are getting on like a house on fire. You feel a little funny about that. You squint at them, “Yeah, seems like it.”  
  
“Hey, Dot!” Lorraine calls, a hand cupped over her mouth. “Break it up!”  
  
Dot turns pale, then beet red. “So, the WPA?” she says to Steve. “We’ll meet at the station?”  
  
“Sure thing,” Steve says, and Dot grins. “I’ll find you there.”

Dot and Lorraine are gone with a few goodbyes, with a few waves between Dot and Steve. “WPA?” you say, feeling pretty goddamn surprised. “No way is she an artist.”  
  
Steve looks way too pleased with himself. “Sketch model, too.”

“God Almighty, guess I know where you’re gonna be from now on,” you groan. “And I know I gotta come _here_ more often. I’ll buy Becks a whole goddamn wardrobe, if that’s what it takes.”

-

You work harder than usual, but this time, it doesn’t bother you so much, because you offer yourself up for it. 

You buy your Ma some sweet-smelling perfume, and you find a new sketchbook and a real nice set of pencils for Steve. His old set spilled over the tracks at the subway station, slipped out from a hole in his bag, and replacing them with something a little more expensive might be the best idea you can come up with.

Truth is, you think you could use some time to yourself and family. You don’t really want to do much else aside from feeling full and listening to the bicker of Becca and Steve and Ma, the chatter between the four of you that always gets louder as the night drags on.

\- 

A week before Christmas, you and Steve manage to find some sad excuse of a tree, haggling with the old guy who owns the ‘farm’ about it until he finally lowers his unfair price. Steve helps you haul it upstairs, pine needles falling all over the place. The two of you don’t have much in the way of decorations, just some tinsel and a star, but when it’s all done, you sling your arm around his shoulders. He leans into you, just a little.  
  
“Well, well, well,” you say. “Ain’t she a looker.”

“Real class act,” Steve says, pats you between the shoulder blades.

“Speakin’ of _lookers_ ,” you start, draw it out, and Steve groans, drops his head back before he twists away from you. You follow him. “Steve, you’re not getting out of here till I know about that Irish broad!”

-

Dot’s eighteen. Only been in Brooklyn for less than a year, and she’s just getting used to the city, but doesn’t do much aside from school and work, aside from getting to the WPA or hanging around Lorraine, who turned out to be her cousin.

Steve insists that they’re good friends, and that he’s not asking anything more from her. When he says she keeps asking him to walk her to the train, you almost smack him upside the head.

See, that’s the thing about him. He’s always looking somewhere else. Dot asks if he’d walk her home, and Steve asks her what she’s doing for the holidays. You mess around with girls that are slim and small with light hair, and Steve asks if you remembered to buy groceries.

-

Midnight mass is freezing, and it’s the first time you’ve been to St. Joseph’s in months. You’ve been giving little white lies, saying you’re going to a church near your tenement since it’s too hard to get up to Vinegar Hill sometimes. 

Steve doesn’t sit in his own pew. You’re used to him going to his usual spot he always sat in with Sarah, but Becca grabs his wrist and whispers, “You’re family too, asshole, sit down.”

You nudge his side and feel him do the same to you during the service. You sing at the right time, say the prayers you know down to your marrow, but all you can feel is the line of Steve’s body against your own.

-

You give Steve his present at your apartment, and you expect his usual schtick, telling you you didn’t have to get him anything, but he smiles at you. His real one is a small, secret thing that comes from his eyes rather than his mouth, and something in your chest gives when he tugs you down, a skinny arm around your neck. It’s too close, leaves your mouth dry, but you swallow the feeling down as best you can. He tugs away though, slipping into the back and digging for something.

“It better not be expensive,” you call. You’re half dressed, pomade in your hair, suspenders hanging at your side. You tug them up, leave your jacket draped over the back of the dining chair for now. You flop down on your seat, maybe a little too hard. Steve says that you’re gonna break that chair, one of these days. “You hear me?”  
  
“Just can it, huh?” Steve says, and hands you two packages. One small and thin, the other bigger and a little bulky. “Merry Christmas, Buck.”  
  
You’re a little hesitant to open both, but you start with the bigger one, tearing away wrapping paper, and finding a box from _Abraham & Straus_. You groan a little, but you open it anyway. “God, Steve,” you say, huff a laugh. The sportcoat is a deep navy, almost black, but it’s nice. Real nice. “This is...how’d you know I needed one?”  
  
He chuckles a little at that. Shrugs. “I thought you needed something that didn’t look so roughed up anymore. You’re always mending that old one, anyway.”

“So, that’s why no one ever wants to dance with me. I don’t stink after all,” you say with mirth in your voice. “I just look like I got roughed up before I got to the dance hall.”  
  
“Yeah, yeah, it’s definitely not ‘cause you’re a jerk,” Steve jabs, then he nods to the other package. “Wanna check that one out? Didn’t cost me anything.”  
  
You set the sportcoat back in its box, set it on the table-cum-bathtub, and open the envelope slowly. This is a little bulky, too. It feels like a canvas.

It _is_ a canvas. It’s not enormous, just a little bigger than your paperbacks lying around the apartment. You tug it free, and turn it around, and—

It’s you.

It’s a mundane scene, just you bent forward on the sofa, buffer in one hand, shoe in the other, in the midst of being polished. It’s all done in ink, full of shadows, just a few dashes of watercolor here and there. The pale blue of your unbuttoned shirt, the yellow label of an empty soda bottle. a slash of pink dusted on your mouth. Your thumb almost skates over his signature in the corner, _SGR, DEC ‘36_ , all looped together.

There’s effort in this. Time was put into this. Steve had to take his time with drawing you, getting all the details right. You know you’re looking at yourself, but there’s something about the sketch. Something you can’t quite put your finger on. Your chest feels heavy.

“Christ,” you say softly, and glance up at Steve. He looks tense, even when you feel your mouth pull into a smile. “That’s—when did you do this? This is what you’re doin’ at the WPA?”

That’s when he relaxes, just a little, tension falling from his shoulders as he laughs, just a little. A strangely relieved sound. “I had a room to myself for a while,” he says, and then he arches a brow at you. “You like it?”  
  
Honestly, it makes you feel seen. You don’t like _that_. You don’t like giving yourself false hope, thinking that maybe Steve is looking at you when you don’t notice, same as you do with him.

Of course, you don’t voice this. You don’t allow yourself to ask any other questions. You bring your arm around his neck and tug him closer, bump your forehead against his for just a moment. Some lines are okay to cross, you think, and you’ve both been a little touchy since Steve nearly—

“I love it,” you say sincerely, squeeze his shoulder hard to keep yourself from doing anything else, and then you lean back a little. “I mean it. Thanks a lot.”  
  
A lot of things feel possible, but then the moment is broken by none other than you. “Now, let’s get outta here,” you say. “Ma’ll kill us both if we’re late.”  
  
-

There are no guests, but Scott Proctor, his parents, and _four kid brothers_ come by for an hour, all a gaggle of copper hair and freckles, loud voices that contrast Scott’s. In the kitchen, Ma says they’re _čače gadje_. She says, at least your father’s family had some spunk.

“Ma, I know Becks and I got some of Pop’s blood, but Jesus H,” you say quietly. “I don’t know how much Proctor I can handle in a lifetime.”

“Don’t tell your sister that,” Ma says, mirth in her voice. “You say you hate him, and she’ll join the damn circus with him.”  
  
You put the last dirty plate away. “Gee, I wonder where she got that from,” you quip.

“No clue,” Ma says, and leans out as you walk out. “And don’t use the lord’s name in vain on Christmas!”  
  
“So, we can use it tomorrow?” Becca calls, and you both laugh. Her hair is long and wavy, only half pinned up, and she’s wearing the clothes you bought her. And, yeah, maybe Lorraine was right. She does look a little like Katharine Hepburn.  
  
It’s a nice enough night, but you, Steve, and Ma are a little relieved when the Proctors say they’re heading home. Becca walks out with them, and you take that as a moment to thunk your head against the wall a few times. Ma laughs when she says, “Come on, Jamie. It wasn’t so bad.”

“I very much beg to differ,” you say, and plop down next to Steve on the sofa, stretching your legs out in front of you. “If I had to hear _‘Gee, Buck’_ one more time, I was gonna lose my mind.”

Steve laughs at that, because you always make your voice too high when you’re trying to mimic Scott. 

“Ya know, you make Scott sound an awful lot like Mickey Mouse,” Steve says. You’re laughing too. A little too hard, and maybe it’s because you and Steve drank a little, but God, you just _noticed_.

“But he does!” you’re saying, and shoving Steve. Ma is laughing too, but she’s saying _terrible, you’re both terrible_. “He fucking does! I swear to God, the kid just—thanks a lot, Steve, now I’m gonna think about him every single time I go to the pictures.”

The door is clicking open. “Okay, enough,” Ma says. “Becca’s gonna knock your heads together if she hears that.”

Rebecca storms in, a little damp with snow and shivering, since she forgot her coat, and says. accusingly, “You guys weren’t making fun of him, were you?”

“What?” you say, holding back a grin as you bring your hand up to your chest. “No! No way, Becks. Scout’s honor.”  
  
She crosses her arms. “You ain’t a boy scout, Buck. That doesn’t mean anything.”  
  
“No, really,” Steve says, and you feel him nudge your ribs with a bony elbow. “We were talking about Mickey Mouse.”

That breaks both of you, and it isn’t even that funny. You shove Steve, saying _you asshole_ , leaning against his shoulder, feeling his ankle bump against yours.

“Oh, you can both go fuck yourselves!” Becca shouts, and that surprises everyone. Even Ma, who’s almost always cursing a blue streak, puts a hand over her mouth.

“Oi devel, Rebecca, he’s _teasing_ ,” Ma groans, but follows after her anyway.

Rebecca storms off and says, “Well, I’m sick of it!” 

With that, she slams her—formerly your—door shut. “Quit breaking my door, benǧoři!” you shout.

Ma gives you a look, gestures for you to cut it out just as Rebecca opens the door to let her in. “It’s my door now!” she hisses, and shuts it again. You lean your head back against the wall. You haven’t missed this at all. A headache is already forming between your eyes, and you’re suddenly relieved you don’t have any other sisters.

“I think it’s official,” Steve says. He’s still smiling a little.  
  
“What is?” you ask.

“Your sister’s scarier than you,” Steve says.

“Pal, _everyone_ knows that,” you chuckle, and get up to apologize, hoping Becca doesn’t bust you a good one when she sees you.

-

There always seems to be a blur between Christmas and New Years, and this year is no different. You hesitantly get back to work, and so does Steve. Now, everything’s turning to a load of waiting. Everyone’s holding their breaths, everyone’s got plans. Funnily enough, you don’t. You thought you would, but you’ve got no date, and no space in your head to look for one.  
  
Frankly, you just want ‘36 to be over. It’s been a long goddamn year, and you’d rather jump headfirst into a new one without looking back.  
  


-

“Let’s go out,” you say from your spot on the couch. It’s finally New Year’s Eve. and it just turned eight o’clock. “Night’s still young, right?”  
  
Steve scoffs. He’s rinsing his hands at the sink, finally finished with a sign that was giving him hell. It’s leaning against the wall by the door now, paint just about dry. “Yeah, sure,” Steve says. “You got someone to go with, I guess.”

It’s not bitter or huffy. You really aren’t sure if Steve cares when you go out with a girl, or if he thinks you’re a bit of a cad since you let ‘em go so quickly, but you know _you_ don’t like him thinking having a girl around means you’ll be tempted to drop him like yesterday’s garbage.

“Nah.” You pull your legs off the coffee table and stand up. Stretch a little. Steve is leaning back against the counter, looking at you with something like wariness before he melts back into neutrality. “But, don’t you think we should ring in the new year somewhere other than here? Come on, we can go see the ball drop.”  
  
“It’s gonna be swamped,” Steve says, but he’s not protesting. Something like excitement floods into your chest. He shoves his bangs out of his eyes, and you watch the path of his fingers through his hair, only for a moment. “You sure about that?”  
  
“I’m up for it if you don’t start any fights. I ain’t starting the year with a broken nose,” you say, and Steve actually laughs at that. He’s been a little down this week, and you know why, of course, know that the Sarah Rogers shaped hole in his life has grown a little too prominent. Maybe Steve will want to get his mind off it for a little while, though, and you know how to fix that well enough.

“No promises,” Steve says. He dries his hands on his pants, sets them on his hips. “Lotta assholes out tonight. I guess that includes us now.”

“You bet it does,” you say, and you’re already racing him to the bedroom, prepared to bundle yourself up good, since it’s already snowing, and it’s not much warmer inside anyway.

-

You make a night of it. The two of you walk around the city, make your way around Rockefeller Center and Fifth Avenue for a while, ducking into stores neither of you can afford before you eventually eat your dinner at _Horn & Hardart’s_, talking for what feels like the first time in forever, getting filled up with food that warms you to the bone, kicking at Steve under the table just to set him off. He almost flicks a spoonful of his pie at you for it.

You’ve both been okay with money, somehow. Maybe it’s because you’ve been working your asses off, but things have been good. Between Steve’s signs and Seville’s grocer and your Christmas bonus, the rent was paid early, and now you two have a little money to spend, which is a miracle in and of itself.

Five minutes to midnight, you and Steve and every other soul in the city are packed into Times Square like sardines, and even with the body heat, it’s still freezing. Your newscap is pulled low on your head, your collar flipped up against the wind.

“Je- _sus,_ ” you say through teeth that definitely aren’t chattering, your arm tight around Steve’s shoulders. “I think we’re gonna turn to a coupla popsicles before ‘37 hits.”

“Well, whose bright idea was it to come out tonight?” Steve asks, but he’s in high spirits, even if he doesn’t want to admit it. “Not mine, I’ll tell ya that.”

“Yeah, well, I ain’t perfect, Rogers,” you say, rub your hand up and down his arm hard to keep him warm. Maybe it isn’t a good idea, Steve being out here for too long, considering how sick he was, but he seems alright, and worse comes to worse, you’ll find a bar to duck into for a while, thaw yourselves out and miss the ball drop. You lean in close, and don’t think twice. Everyone’s so wrapped up in themselves, they pay you no mind. “You gonna try to get a kiss?”  
  
Steve sputters at that, but he’s grinning, face pink with cold, and maybe embarrassment. His lips are red and wet because he keeps licking them, staving off the dryness, same as you. “Are you?” he asks.  
  
“Sure am,” you answer smoothly. It’s a lie, since you didn’t really plan on it, just planned on being out with Steve, but it seems like something you’re supposed to say. “It’s good luck, and I’m sure some dame’ll want some luck to get her through the year.”

“If I were a dame and you said that to me, I’d punch you in the nose,” Steve says, but he’s laughing.

“If you were a dame, every guy in Brooklyn would be fallin’ over each other to talk to you,” Bucky teases. “And you’d sooner give ‘em a kick to the family jewels than the time of day.”  
  
They squeeze aside as a group files out of the crowd. “You’ve put some thought in this. You think about me as a dame a lot, Buck?” Steve says, just low enough for you to hear. 

“Oh, _yeah_ ,” you deadpan as a few snowflakes begin to fall. “I’m real glad you’re not, though. Ma would have been pushin’ me to put a ring on your finger by now.”

Truth is, life would have been so easy if that were the case. You wouldn’t have to choke down your guilt, your shame for looking at Steve for too long, but at the same time, you wouldn’t want that. You like him the way he is. You think you—

No, you don’t think. You _know_. You know you love him, and you know your reasons for that. You fell in love with floppy hair and a crooked beak of a nose, with charcoal stained hands that are too big for his body, for ribs you could probably count out with ease if you got the chance to touch him. So, no, you don’t wish things were different.

You just wish they were easier.

“I woulda said no, anyway,” Steve says, and pulls you from your spiral, thankfully. You laugh at that for real, because yeah, of course he would have.

You squeeze him a little closer and tell yourself it’s because of the cold. “Eh, I woulda wore you down eventually.”

The conversation fizzles out, but soon enough someone yells, “One minute!” and any discomfort is ebbed away. A few people start counting down, but you think it’s too early for it. You’ll wait.

“I tell you, I can’t wait for this year to be over,” you say. “How do ya wanna start it off?”

 _Twenty-nine, twenty-eight, twenty-seven..._  
  
“You pick it,” Steve says, and you’re not even looking at the ball anymore. It seems like all the lights in Times Square are brightening up his eyes.

“I say we drink ourselves stupid and see if we can find our way home afterward,” you say, speaking louder as the crowds get louder. “You still haven’t been out with me, anyhow, and you’ve been of age since July!”

“Fine!” Steve says, and tugs you down a little. “Now quit talking and start counting!”  
  
You force yourself to watch the ball instead of him as you count from ten, but toward the end, you think you can feel Steve’s eyes on you. You think he’s looking at you, but there’s no time to think about it ‘cause—

“HAPPY NEW YEAR!”

The entire square erupts into cheering, and you’re grabbing onto Steve, you’re both doing the same. You rub your knuckles hard on his head through his hat, and with the gaggle of people kissing around you, you think about doing the same, even out in the open. You’re both grinning, faces red and wind bitten, and it’s snowing for real now. Heavy and dampening your scarf.

“Come on, let’s try to get to the train!” you shout over the noise, and link your arm with Steve’s as he yells, “It’s gonna be a madhouse, Buck!”

He’s right, but you’d rather be down in the subway station than outside in the snow anymore. You’ll finish your night in Brooklyn, find one of your usual haunts to hang around at.

You feel bad making Steve run through the streets in the cold, but if you don’t get to a platform soon, you’ll be stuck in the city till sunrise.

-

Somehow, you get into a car filled with people, smushed in with Steve on your right and a crying woman on your left. You make a face at him to say, _jeez_ , and mouth _what happened?_

You feel bad for joking and Steve is, surprisingly, telling _you_ to shut up and not make a fuss, which, yeah, that’s a joke right there.

“Dev- _el_ ,” you say quietly, snickering, since he knows enough Romanes from being around you all the time. He suppresses a laugh, eyes on you. “Či kamlem lako prikaza pe muro nevo berš.”

He doesn’t get everything since he shrugs halfway through, only catching _prikaza_ since you’ve been saying that constantly now that your Ma isn’t there to yell every time it slips out of your mouth.

“Hey, pal,” someone calls, a little slurred, but sharp. “What’s so funny?”  
  
It takes a second to realize the guy is sitting in front of you, and talking to you. “Why don’t you find a mirror and then maybe you’ll get the joke?” Steve says, and oh, _Christ_ , here we go.

“Oh, so you’re _both_ a couple of jokers, huh?” the guy says to Steve, louder than before. His face is flushed from drinking, making his light blond hair almost appear white, and then he looks back to you. He’s not much older than either of you, but either way, you’re not feeling up to a fight. It’s been a good night. “I know that tongue, buddy. Heard those words plenty’a times. Keep your sticky fingers to yourself.”  
  
“Don’t know what you’re talking about,” you snap. There are a few people sparing glances your way now. “Maybe your brain got a little pickled tonight. Try cutting back on the sauce. Your gal might thank ya for it.”

He’s up and in your face at that. You can’t deny the way your stomach gives a little jolt, but you lift your chin, grind your teeth as he breathes hot, sour breath in your face. “You might thank _me_ when I say you should quit while you’re ahead,” he says, low and dangerous, and grabs you by the lapels of your coat. “I should knock your teeth out, you fuckin’ gypsy. I’m sick of seein’ your kind around my city, you’re like a bunch of fuckin’ rats.”

Steve is trying to wedge himself in, trying to get in the guy’s face. “Hey, now listen here—”  
  
“Shut your trap, Steve,” you say without taking your eyes off the drunk, who’s still waiting for a reason to knock you out. “I’ll handle it.”  
  
“Yeah, _Steve_ ,” the drunk says, whips his head to Steve before he turns back to you. “Your boyfriend can handle himself.”

“You hopin’ I’m a queer now?” you cut in, and furious dark eyes look back at you. “That what this is about? You want me to suck your cock or something?”

A few people groan at that. Someone says to break it up. Someone tells you there are ladies in the train. “Oh, you’re askin’ for it now,” the drunk says. “You know, you look like no one’s ever hit you in your life.”  
  
“You’d be surpr—”  
  
Before you can finish, there’s a fist in your jaw and it makes your head shake, your mouth filling with blood as you bite into your cheek. You crumple a little, but take it for the most part. It’s fruitless, because you get caught in the stomach a second later, and the guy, too fast for being so drunk, shoves you back a few steps.

“Grow a pair and fight back!” he says. “I know you want to!”

“You fucking asshole,” you hear Steve hiss, and then there’s two crunches of fists against flesh. You raise your head and find the guy with a bloody nose, Steve pulling himself off the filthy floor. 

Your blood boils. Steve’s the one who has violence in his veins, who has a big mouth and a tendency to not quit even while he’s getting pummeled, but that doesn’t mean you don’t know how to go in fists flying.

“Thought this was between you and me,” you puff out and catch the guy in his nuts with your knee, lift your leg up to shove your shoe against his chest and knock him back into his seat hard.

“Let’s get off,” you say to Steve, and swallow blood and spit. You could do more, but you won’t. “Our stop’s here, anyway. Ain’t worth it.”  
  
“Buck—”  
  
“Will you listen to me for once?” you shout without meaning to, rounding on him as the train slows to a stop at Carroll Street station. “Get off the goddamn train.” 

You turn back to the guy and twist a hand in his hair, feeling a few strands come out. “You wanna follow us?” you bark, loud enough for everyone else to hear. “Go ahead. Come on. I’ll wait outside for you and knock _your_ fuckin’ teeth out.” When you let go, his head thunks hard against the window. There’s a mixture of sweat and blood on his upper lip, meaning Steve did get a hit in.

The doors are opening and you shove Steve out first. Walk out backwards to make sure the guy stays in his seat

“You better be glad this is your stop, gyp!” he shouts, surging forward.

“Happy New Year!” you call as the doors shut.

-

By the time you get a couple fingers of whiskey in you, you feel a little better. 

Steve, on the other hand, is still livid.

“What the hell was his problem, anyway?” he says for the third time, losing control over the volume of his voice the more he drinks. He’s already red in the cheeks with it, the side of his head a little swollen from the meaty fist that swung into it. “You didn’t say anything to him, so what, was he just watching you? Waiting for a reason to start a fight?”  
  
“Now, who does _that_ remind me of?” you ask, rub your chin thoughtfully. 

Steve shoves your hand down, face pinched and sour. “Come on, it ain’t funny.”

“Can you just forget about it?” you ask. “I’m not letting that prick ruin my night, so why’s it eating at you so bad?”

“‘Cause I don’t think it’s fair,” Steve says seriously. He rolls his glass back and forth on the bar, eyes on you. “There’s people out there living their lives, not bothering anyone, and guys like that will _always_ have something to say about it. Don’t you worry about Becca and your ma when there’s people like that out there?”  
  
You take a long drink from your glass, swish the whiskey in your mouth and feel it sting the roughened skin of your inner cheek. 

“Stevie,” you say. “I’d drive myself crazy if I thought about it all the time. I’ll deal with it when it happens, and that’s all I can say. Can’t change everyone’s minds. Ain’t just Roma treated like dirt, anyway. There’s plenty of other people getting treated a lot worse than us, just remember that. Not much we can do unless the whole world up and decides it isn’t right. You don’t have to come in swinging just ‘cause someone says boo to me. I can handle it.”

“I know I don’t have to, I just.” Steve takes a gulp from his glass, pretends he doesn’t like it, but Steve’s got Irish blood and a seemingly iron liver. You motion to the bartender for a refill for both of you. “I don’t want you dealing with that alone, you know? You’re the one who said I don’t have to get by on my own. That goes two ways, Buck. You don’t gotta carry everything on your shoulders.”

His hand lands hard on your arm, squeezes as if to make sure you can feel it. You smile despite feeling a little too mushy, just a hair past tipsy, and broaden your expression to a grin. “I bet you say that to all the girls, Rogers.”

That helps, eases some of the heaviness from the moment. Steve grins, a closed mouth thing, looking away from you for just a second. You shrug him off a little and clink your glass against his. “Now forget that shit so we can start ‘37 off right,” you say. “Drunk off our asses.”

-

You, indeed, get drunk off your asses.

You feel like you’ve been shoved underwater, and there’s this rotten taste in your mouth that not even your cigarettes can get rid of. You keep tripping over your own feet, and your arm is locked tight around Steve. He’s doing the same, his bony grip crushing you around your waist. You aren’t sure who’s holding who up anymore, but you know that if you let go, you’ll both tumble into the icy streets and crack your heads open.

The snow picks up as you get closer to home, but it’s not windy, which makes it easier. “See?” you say. “Who needs that ice rink in the city when we got good ol’ Van Brunt Street!”

“When you slip and break your neck,” Steve slurs, chuckling. He’s drank before, of course, but never like tonight. “I’m not fuckin’ draggin’ you back home, y’can figure it out.”  
  
“Wait, I thought I broke my—hey!” you cut yourself off to shout after a gaggle of girls, who seem to be braving the cold just fine. “You dames vampires or something? It’s too late for wanderin’ around!”

You can’t see the girl, not with the snow and your fuzzy vision. She comes in and out of focus and you squint through the dark for a better look. “You wanna come over here and do something about it?” she calls, and her friends laugh.

You hold your arms out. “Sweetheart, I’d say yes if you were on the other side of Niagara Falls and I had to swim to you,” you say, and you’re taking a step forward, but Steve’s arms wrap around your middle and drag you backward. “Alright, casanova, ‘s fuckin’ freezin’, let’s _go_.”  
  
“Yeah, yeah,” you say, and the girls are already gone anyway, disappearing down the corner. You hold onto Steve for support again, walk the final block to your tenement. “You think I had a chance?” you ask.

“Oh, yeah,” Steve says, deadpan, and blinks snowflakes out of his eyes. “I think she woulda been the future Mrs. James Barnes.”  
  
“If only I knew her name,” you say with a dreamy sigh, and it isn’t that funny but it makes you both laugh, anyway. 

You slip through the door of your building on shaky legs. Even drunk, you both avoid the hole in the third stair—thanks to the plumber stomping down like it was the end of the world. “Be funny if I lost my keys,” Steve says, half to himself as he digs through his pockets. You hear the clink of the keys as you lean against the door, though. Shut your eyes for half a second. “Think Mrs. Gillespie would have let us in if I did?”  
  
“She’d beat us out like mice,” you grin, and then your stomach drops as the door opens beneath you and you yelp, fall into the apartment, head thunking forward, your cap falling off as you hit the ground. “ _Christ_ , Steve!”

Steve is laughing soundlessly, half slumped against the now-shut door. “Sorry,” he wheezes, tosses his hat somewhere. His hair is damp with snow, cheeks red with cold and drunkness. You snort out a laugh despite feeling pretty miffed, too lazy to move from your spot on the floor. “Oh, hell, Buck, sorry that was—”  
  
He never finishes. You kick him in the back of his knee and send him tumbling down, landing with an _oof_ , right on top of you. “You think that’s funny?” you ask, trailing into another spell of giggling that you feel in your stomach. “Who’s laughin’ now, asshole?”  
  
“Still me,” Steve says through it, fingers curled in the lapels of your coat. Your hands find their way up to his shoulders, torn between shoving him off and leaving him where he is. “The _sound_ you made.”

“Yeah, yeah, all right, yuck it up, get your jollies, Steve,” you say without much malice, cheeks hot and aching from grinning. Your whole face feels a little funny from drinking, from getting punched, from falling. “I don’ like bein’ laughed at much, so this is your last chance.”  
  
“No, no, I’m done,” Steve says, taking a shaky breath, slow and hot and tinged with whiskey, right in your face. He’s so close, but he’s shifting and blurring right in front of your eyes. His gloved hands are close to your neck, knuckles brushing the undersides of your jaw. Your gut swims a little at that. “I think I’m done.”

“Sure about that?” you ask, and stare at him long enough to start laughing again. You don’t even know why you do. Maybe it’s because you’re happy. You’ve had a pretty good night despite everything, just being around Steve with no catches, no interruptions. “I’ll say it again, I’m giving you one last—”

Steve grabs your face and kisses you so hard his teeth clack against yours.

It’s wet and sloppy. His lips are ice cold and taste of alcohol, and his body is light and hollow on top of yours.

You can’t seem to move, can’t seem to respond aside from the surprised, muffled sound you make against Steve’s mouth, but your heart is pounding, eyes wide open, zeroed in on a big blond head, and maybe not responding is a terrible idea, because Steve immediately pulls away, breathless, staring down at you with wide eyes.

You must be doing the same to him. You can barely breathe. “Steve. What,” you blurt out dumbly. “What was that for?”

Steve swallows. You can hear the click of his throat, feel his shaky breath in your face. “Bad luck to go into the new year without kissing,” he says after a moment, voice low and a little husky. “‘S what you said.”

Your mouth opens and closes like a fish, words stuck in your throat. 

God, he finally does what you always wanted him to do, and it’s like your brain has melted out of your ears. “Yeah,” you say, feeling more blindsided than you did a moment ago, brows knitting together. “Yeah, I—yeah, Steve. I just didn’t…”  
  
Steve’s jaw works, and you have to suppress a shiver as a leather clad thumb ghosts over the dimple in your chin —like Andy did the first time he kissed you—, lingers there for a second before Steve moves his hand away like you’ve burned him. “Oh,” he breathes out, more alarmed than before. “Oh, Jesus, Bucky, I—lemme get off you.”  
  
“No!” you say quickly, and tighten your grip on him without really realizing it. “No, no, it’s okay. ‘S okay, Steve, I mean it.”

“Don’t just say that,” Steve says, and now he looks angry. All the ease, all the thrill the kiss brought drained out of him. Your mouth is still tingling with it. You swallow hard, and even though you weren’t the one to initiate, you still feel like you’ve messed things up. “Just forget it happened.”  
  
“Steve, just hold on a damn _minute_.”

It’s too late, he’s already moving off you, making a beeline for the bedroom and shutting the door. You’ve never seen him run away from anything, and of all people to run from, he chooses you.

You don’t move.  
  
You don’t move for a very long time.  
  
-

For a while, you watch the clock tick in the dark and listen to the sounds of the city mingled with your heavy breathing, still reeling.

Did it mean anything? 

You can’t help wondering. Your head is too clear now. Your body is still clumsy and weak, but your thoughts are completely, startlingly clear.

What if it really is just a drunken mistake? Steve might not want this at all. Hell, he might not even be queer, but the thought of finally having an answer is too much. You can feel your pulse in your throat, beating in your legs. Your dick is straining against your zipper, sending shocks of painful want up through your stomach as you shift upward, shucking your coat off to drop it on the hook.

You splash your face with cold water, find that your hands are shaking when you move to cover your mouth with them. You take a sharp breath in through your nose, teeth clamping on the flesh of your palm. You shut your eyes so tightly. patterns erupt into the blackness.

You know the longer you sit out here, the worse this will be, but there’s a knot in your throat and it feels like you’re wearing cinderblocks instead of shoes. 

It’s a nightmare. A bonafide nightmare. 

You twist your fingers in your hair, scrub them through hard enough to loosen it from its style. It’s a mess now, and you smack both sides of your face. Take a breath. Try to chalk your buckling knees up to too much drinking. It doesn’t work.  
  
It takes too much effort to move, to knock on the door, head leaned against the wood. “Steve,” you call in a rasp, too pitifully. You feel like a dog locked out of the house, like you could wait for hours to be let in from the cold. “Steve, come on, let me in.”

No response. You knock again, and still, no dice. “Jesus,” you mutter, curse to yourself, and open the door.  
  
Steve’s clothes are folded on the dresser, and he’s in bed, but you know he’s not asleep. You do your best not to show him you see that, methodically taking off your shoes, stripping to your skivvies and folding your clothes with fumbling fingers, leaving them next to his and crossing the room, nearly tripping over Steve’s shoes. You toss them in the corner.

You pull the sheet back. The bed creaks when you sit on it. You feel wound tight, like you’re about to snap. “I know you’re awake,” you say, just loud enough for Steve to hear, eyes on the floor, hands wringing in the sheets. “I ain’t mad, Steve. Honest.”

Gingerly, you swing your legs up, get under the covers, body melting into the bed despite how awful you feel. You turn onto your side, stare a hole into the back of Steve’s head, and your hand doesn’t shake as you reach out, rest it on his arm. “Hey,” you say. You feel like you’re begging. Maybe you are. You scoot closer when he doesn’t shrug you off. He’s completely in his own bed, and you cross into it, feel the dip between both mattresses at your back. “I mean it.”

You were pitching a tent earlier, but in your stress, you’ve softened, which is a small mercy at this point.  
  
“I know you do,” Steve says after what feels like forever. “I know. Don’t cut yourself up about it. I shouldn’t have done that. I’m sorry.”  
  
You take a steadying breath. “What if,” you say, the knot in your throat tightening. “What if I wanted you to do it.”  
  
Steve exhales, sharp and annoyed. “You’re drunk,” he says. “You’d say that to anyone else, too.”  
  
he probably doesn’t mean it to, but it hurts. Bad. And you’re not completely sure why it does. You just know it’s like a hot knife through your stomach. “Not true,” you insist quietly. You squeeze his arm as you come closer, flatten your front against his back. “That’s not true.”

“Just leave it alone, Bucky,” Steve hisses, voice barely above a whisper. “Let it go. I’m done talkin’ about it.”  
  
You’re annoyed, you’ll be honest. You didn’t _do_ anything, so what right does Steve have to be angry with you?

“Fine,” you snap, and shove away from him pointedly. Turn onto your side of the bed, as close to the edge as you can get without falling. “Fine. That’s just fuckin’ great.”

“If you’re gonna turn this into a fight—”  
  
“Not a fight. I’m not you, remember? I know when to back off,” you say. You hope it hurts, and then you regret thinking that at all. You shut your eyes. “I just don’t get it.”

“Get what?” Steve asks sharply.

You’re finished. You sit up and face him. “You,” you say. “I don’t get _you_ . You kissed me, and you’re acting like I’m the one who fucked everything up.”  
  
Steve shoots out of the bed, whips around to face you. There’s a melting pot of emotions on his face —anger, hurt, something like fear. _Because of the kiss or something else?_ “So, I fucked everything up?” he echoes. “That’s what you’re saying, so it’s gotta be true.”  
  
“You’re fucking everything up because you don’t give a man a minute to say his goddamn _piece_!”

It echoes in the little room. You snap your jaw shut, heart in a frenzy all over again as Steve stares you down, expression steely in the dark, face all sharp edges. “You know, maybe if you didn’t run out on me, maybe if you gave me a second to get my head together, we wouldn’t be arguing about this,” you say. “Maybe I would have…”  
  
You don’t finish, but Steve gets the message loud and clear.

He drops his head forward, fists tight at his sides. “You don’t mean that,” he says. You aren’t sure who he’s trying to explain that to. Who he’s trying to fool. “You don’t.”  
  
“Quit telling me what I mean and what I don’t mean,” you say pointedly, moving across the bed quickly. “I know how to use my own brain, Rogers. Not stupid, no matter what anyone says.”  
  
If you don’t do this, everything might be ruined for good. If you _do_ do this, everything might be ruined for good. This isn’t a situation where the odds are in your favor. 

But they never are, anyway.

You bring your hands to either side of Steve’s jaw, force yourself to look him in the eye. He looks...you aren’t sure how he looks, but you know you never want to see it on his face again. 

“Look, if it really was a mistake and you want me gone after this, I’ll stay gone, I promise,” you croak, and Steve doesn’t move a muscle. “But I just, I gotta know.”  
  
The air in the room feels off. Too heavy, on the verge of swirling around you. It’s like being deep up to your neck in the ocean, cold wherever you’re submerged. You gulp down a breath, force another out through your mouth. “I gotta know, Steve.”

Your mouth presses to his. A chaste, dry thing compared to the frenzied kiss on the living room floor. It’s impersonal. Tentative. An experiment. This time, it’s slow, but it’s worse. You’re both tense and terrified, like you’ve never done this before at all. It definitely feels that way.

You try again, tilt your head into it, and hear yourself moan when Steve starts to kiss back; just a little at first, but then he’s slowly melting into it. Your movements are sloppy, and so are his. Both of you are tired and drunk and lonely, a little tainted with something like misery.

“Buck,” Steve mutters against your mouth. “You don’t have’ta if you don’t wanna.”  
  
“I want to,” you whisper, and it’s the closest to the truth you can get without everything you always wanted to say spilling out of you. Steve’s breath hitches against your mouth, hands slipping up your chest. “So, c’mere.”  
  
He does, and steals another kiss, quick and firm, his hands fisted in the front of your shirt, moving toward the side of your face before pulling away just as fast, leaving you chasing his mouth, trying to understand what’s going wrong. “What?” you ask.

Steve doesn’t move, eyes still on your lips. He’s tense, too worked up. Too—

He doesn’t want it. Not really. You feel like ice water has been poured over your head.  
  
“You wanna just...” you swallow, lick your lips. “You wanna just put a pin in it?”

“Might be better we do,” Steve says, like a knife has been lodged in his throat. “I don’t think I can—”  
  
“Me neither,” you mutter, not even bothering to listen because you know you’ll agree with whatever he’s about to say. You mean it, because it isn’t fair. It’s the furthest from fair you could get. Why do you feel like something is going wrong? “Sorry.”  
  
A quick shake of the head. “Don’t.” Steve is twisting away from you, and you don’t even try to stop him. “Don’t, Buck. Just get some sleep, I’ll...I’ll be back. I just need a minute.”  
  
You don’t move a muscle. You let him go.

-

In the morning, you wake like you always do. Mechanically, eyes flipping open, staring at blue tinged light flooding into the room, with Steve’s body wrapped around your own.

His cold nose is pressing to the back of your neck, his arm wrapped tight around your middle, palm pressed flat over your heart. That’s new. Usually, you have a bony elbow in your ribs or an arm flopped against your chest, feel him slumped against your body.

It’s too easy to stay like this. You still want it, but if he’s still raw about last night—

You have work, anyway. You’d might as well get an early start.

-

Just in case Steve thinks you skipped town on him, you leave a note. _Didn’t want to wake you_ , you write, _will_ _be back at 6 - Buck_.

-

You go through the motions, working mindlessly, beginning to hate the way carrying crates make you ache from the neck down, the endless chatter from the other guys, the smell of dead fish and sea water.

There’s gotta be more than this.

-

You run into Steve at the door, and you both act like that’s a coincidence. “Hey,” you say. “You just get back?”  
  
Steve nods, and then a stunned smile crosses his face. “I got a full-time gig at the WPA,” he says, and looks you in the eye this time, like all the wrongness between you has gone away. “It’s just more ads, more hours spent down there, but, Buck, I’ll be getting $23.60 a _week_.”

That leaves you reeling. That’s almost the entire rent, and Steve’ll get it per week for _painting._ “God. You gotta get me a gig there, maybe I’ll be an actor or somethin’,” you say, opening the door. “Think I got the chops for it?”

Of course, you’re happy, but a strange, selfish part of you worries that it means he doesn’t need your help with the rent. That maybe soon enough he’ll—

Steve laughs, visibly uneasy. He hangs his coat and hat beside yours and says, “Yeah, you’ll be the next Cary Grant. I’ll let ‘em know.”

Your smile feels tight on your face.

-

You end up back at Ma’s, the both of you, just to have dinner at her insistence. For once, you’re relieved to have a buffer between you and Steve, and you both put on a good show. It’s only on the way home, a long, freezing walk, he knits his brows together, eyes settled on the icy sidewalks.  
  
“How long were we out last night?” he asks.

You shrug, and then you get a burst of clarity so intense, it almost makes you stop in your tracks. You try your damnedest not to show it. “A while, I guess,” you lie, breath out a laugh that scrapes against your throat. “I don’t remember a whole lot, if I’m bein’ honest.”  
  
The uncomfortable set to Steve’s shoulders slip away, and for the first time since last night, he looks you in the eye. “You know what?” he says, a smile creeping up his mouth, like it’s _funny_. “Neither do I.”

Maybe he really doesn’t remember. You aren’t sure who was drunker last night, but you do know that if you have the chance to sweep that mess under the rug, you’ll do it.“Well, aren’t we a pair of geniuses,” you say, and pull Steve under your arm. He doesn’t shrink away from you, and something in your chest settles.

In the long run, maybe this is better for both of you. You both continue to sleep on your respective sides of the makeshift bed, and stick there, even as the night stretches on. Your toes accidentally brush the back of Steve’s knee as you wake the next morning, and you jerk away, stomach jolting violently.

You think he notices, but he never says so.

-

Everything goes back to whatever qualified as normal before. Steve goes to work, you go to work. You start going back to dance halls on the weekends, forcing yourself to do more than walk a dame home, especially when they give you the eyes about it. You try to get Steve to go on a couple of double dates with you, and some of them are all right, but mostly, his dates find a way to weasel themselves away from him with some kind of excuse.

You can’t make sense of it. Yeah, maybe Steve’s jokes are a little dry. Maybe he’s not good at pretending to listen, but that doesn’t mean he should be on the last person on anyone’s list.

“They don’t know what they’re missin’” you say, on the way back from dropping Nancy and her friend off at their place. “I tell you, Steve, if they looked a little closer, they’d see it.”  
  
“Yeah, you always say that,” he grumbles, slaps your shoulder lightly before shoving his hand back in his pocket. It shouldn’t feel like much, but it’s the first time he’s touched you since New Years. He huffs a laugh. “I think you’re oversellin’ me, Buck. Dames always seem let down when they meet me.”  
  
“What?” you say, brows raising up. “If anyone’s bein’ oversold, it’s me.”

“What are you telling ‘em, anyway?” Steve asks.

You shrug, feeling suddenly on the spot. “Well, I tell ‘em I’ve got a buddy if one of their girl friends are looking for a night out, if we could go somewhere, all four of us. I dunno. I just tell ‘em the good stuff, Stevie. No frills.”  
  
“What the hell does no frills mean?”

“Means I say, “I got this friend. He’s a real jerk, and he works down at the WPA, but he’s a greedy bastard and likes having extra money, so he still draws for eight pa—’” Steve covers your mouth with a sweaty hand, a stark contrast to the cold. “Jesus, do you always gotta mention that in public?”

He’s snickering when he says it, moves his hand off your mouth when you promise not to say anything more about it. When you grin, he’s already jogging away from you.

“I tell ‘em you’re always looking for dames to model nude, too!” you shout.

  
He stops in his tracks. “That was _one time_ , and Dot asked _me_ to draw her!” he hisses. “I didn’t know she was gonna take her blouse off!”

“And more than that!” You remember Steve coming back from the community center after promising to meet Dot there that day at _Abraham & Straus_, red as a tomato, sketch book clutched close like it had a plot to drop a bomb on Manhattan in it. Apparently, he and Dot had nothing much in common aside from liking art and having a dry sense of humor. Apparently, they’re still pretty good friends. “Lucky her. A few years’ time, she’ll be able to say she modeled for a bonafide, original Rogers.”

At home, things get more comfortable. Sweeping New Years under the rug might have been the best decision you’ve ever made.

-

You feel impossibly young and decades old by your twentieth birthday. Rebecca bakes you a strawberry pie, sticks a couple candles in. It’s sort of becoming a tradition between the two of you— she makes you something for your birthday, and you do the same for hers. For her sixteenth, you go out on a limb and save up to get ingredients to make her a carrot cake. You’re a decent baker as well as a cook, it turns out. Even if your first try is a little crispy around the edges.

You still make it a point to go with Steve and Becca to Coney Island on July 3rd, somehow convincing her not to bring Scott along since, well, that’s a thing the three of you do together. 

You and Steve dig some spending money from your hiding spots, and Becca does the same. She’s working too, now, part-time in the garment district. You hate seeing her work her fingers to the bone, but she wants to save. Keeps going on about going to school, becoming a nurse. It’s surreal, seeing her grow into less of a kid and more of an adult.

When the fireworks erupt over the boardwalk, you try to actually watch them, and do your best not to look at Steve.

For his birthday, you get him a bunch of oil paints and brushes from some swanky looking art supply store in Manhattan. It burns a hole through your pocket, but it doesn’t matter to you, because he looks so damn happy about it, and for the first time since winter, you want to kiss him so bad it makes your lips feel a little funny.

-

Speaking of New Years, it seems to have brought a new problem into your life, and you don’t even know why it starts, really.

Maybe people remember your roots, or listen too closely when you talk, or maybe they just smell it off you, but plenty of people decide they don’t much like you and throw some nasty shit in your direction.

In August, the foreman at the shipyard suddenly passes away, and someone else takes the job on. Before anything happens at all, you know this is a bad sign. The foreman wasn’t a nice guy, not at all, but he kept you around since, according to him, his great-grandfather was Roma. He didn’t speak a lick of the language, but it left you getting away with more, surprisingly since he said you were ‘blood’.

The new foreman, Powell, is running the show for two months when he fires you under the pretense of slacking off, which isn’t goddamn fair and you _say so_ , unable to hold your anger back. You’ve been here since you moved down to Red Hook. You’re the ninth guy to go since Powell started, and it ain’t fair. He’s just getting rid of whoever he doesn’t like the look of. You’re busting your ass hauling crates around for hours, barely taking a break for anything but scarfing down your lunch.

It doesn’t seem to matter. You’re waved off like it’s nothing. He hands you your pay and tells you to beat it, that he’s not soft, and doesn’t have an obligation to keep you around anymore, since he doesn’t like you much, anyhow. Says you know exactly why. 

You storm out of the yard, lighting a hasty smoke. No one follows you. Don and Arthur, Eddie and Andy and the rest, are all too worried about losing their jobs too, but so far, it’s just been you who’s been sacked, along with a few Italian guys and Pete Cohen, whose father owned the Jewish bakery near your tenement, got kicked to the curb the day before you did.

When you get home, the apartment is empty. Of course it is. Steve’s still working, and God, the last thing you want is him to find out what happened. The last thing you want is to have to put the pressure of working on him ‘til you find a job.

You leave the radio loud, and skim through _Frankenstein_ , even though you’ve read it a few times before. The spine is cracked. The pages dog-eared. There’s a faint brown stain on the cover from accidentally spilling coffee on it.

The afternoon stretches and stretches until Steve finally gets back, and you startle when the door opens. He does the same, since he obviously didn’t expect you to be lazing around for another hour or so, especially still in your work clothes. And because you never smoke inside. You feel a little bad about that, so you kill it in your glass of water.

“What are you doing back?” Steve asks, brows knitted together. And maybe he sees how wound up you are, or maybe he sees the anger etched into your face. You don’t know how to fix that. Don’t know how to stop showing how you feel. His shoulders slump forward. “Buck, don’t tell me what I think you’re gonna tell me.”

You flop back against the chair, feeling more than a little raw about it. “I’m gonna find something else,” you say, and you don’t know why. He shakes his head, tries to argue with you about it, but you’re talking over him. “I’m gonna find something better than hauling shit around and getting paid _squat_ for breaking my back every goddamn day, Steve. It’s better off. Powell hated my guts for breathing around his damn yard and I didn’t do _nothin’_ to him, but he tossed me out like yesterday’s garbage.”

“Bucky—”

“It’s horse shit, is what it is!” you shout, not exactly at Steve, just...at everything. At Powell, at yourself, at whoever else treated you like trash when they found out what you were. “I’m there, crack of dawn, whenever I’m s’posed to be, and what do I get in return for it? Barely enough to make the rent!”  
  
“Bucky, that’s _enough_ ,” Steve says sharply, and seemingly out of nowhere, he’s behind you, hands firm and tight on your shoulders. He smells of turpentine and the subway, the rain brimming in the air. Your head dips down, hands twisted in your hair. You can barely remember the last time you didn’t have a job. You shined shoes, helped neighbors paint, stocked the back room at Mr. Trentini’s, washed the rich folks’ cars in Williamsburg. You don’t know how to be idle. “You’ll figure it out. Quit beatin’ yourself up about it, all right? Powell was an asshole. He would have...Buck, it was now or later.”  
  
“Yeah,” you rasp. You prefer the truth. You hate sugar-coating things, and so does Steve. “Yeah, I know. I just don’t want you to feel like you have to keep us afloat till I find something worth while.”  
  
Steve squeezes your shoulders. You wish you could lean back into him, relax into the touch, but all you can do now is not push him off. Anything else might be too much. “We’ll figure it out,” he says. His voice is even and sure. “We always do.”  
  
You think that if anyone else told you so, you wouldn’t believe them at all, but Steve just might be right. Little dickhead that he is, he ends up being right when he has his head screwed on like he does now.

-

“Powell gave you the boot, too?” Pete asks around a cigarette, catching you outside after you pick up a couple bagels from his father’s bakery. You’re not much hungry, but you can’t stand staying home anymore playing house. Going back to Odie’s and playing a few hands sounds good now. You haven’t been back in forever. “That’s the pits, Barnes. Sorry to hear it.”

“I’ll figure it out,” you say for what feels like the hundredth time. You’ve been avoiding home like the plague, and you’re not saying you’re not working down at the docks anymore until you can say, _hey, Ma, I got a new job_. “Gotta be something for a guy to do around these parts.”

“You live nearby, right?” Pete asks. “I see you and that buddy of yours around a lot.”  
  
“Tenement down the block,” you say, jerk your head in its general direction before shrugging. You pull a cigarette from your pack, stick it between your lips. “It’s like livin’ in a matchbox but we like it just fine. Speakin’ of matches, you got a light, Petey?”  
  
Pete smirks and lights you up. Smoke fills your lungs for the first time today and you nearly shiver with relief. You’ve been at it too much lately. You know it by the tightness in your lungs. “Say,” Pete starts, tosses the butt of his own cigarette to the curb. “You don’t happen to know your way around a kitchen, do ya?”

You chuckle. “I’m the only one aside from my Ma who doesn’t burn everything I touch,” you say. “Why? You two need a helping hand or something?”

Pete shrugs, shoves his bangs out of his eyes. Strangely, it reminds you of Steve, but you shake that thought away. Pete’s good looking. Handsome, actually, all dark hair and darker eyes with a clean-shaven, square jaw, but you aren’t sure if he’s swinging your direction. You don’t think you’ll ask. 

“Could use someone to clean up and such, help the old man out,” he says. “I’m trying my hand at school, so I won’t be around much. Shame to let him run the place alone. It won’t be too hard, and he’ll pay you—”

“Tell him yes,” you say quickly. “I’ll do it.”

Pete seems taken off-guard by that, and a laugh spilled out of his mouth. “Barnes, hold your horses, you sure?” he asks, holds up a hand. “Plenty of other places’ll pay you a lot better.”  
  
“Beats smellin’ like a dead fish,” you say, already feeling a thrum of relief in your blood. You’ll take something extra on. Anything. Hell, you’ll sell tickets at the movie house downtown, you don’t _care_. “Whatever you need, I’m your guy.”

“Ain’t you something?” Pete says, a wry grin on his mouth. In a rush, he’s got an arm around your shoulders. The bell on the door jingles as he opens it, shoves you inside. “Hey, tate! Get down here! Someone I want you to meet!”

-

It’s surprisingly hard work.

Your arms burn from kneading bread and mopping and washing out pans and pots until your hands are dry and cracked, but Cohen is paying you more than you expected him to, and guess what? You like it. In fact, you think you love it.

You like that you’re trusted to close up. You like the hard work. Maybe you get whacked in the back of the head with a wooden spoon when you’re not doing something right, but it’s better than baking in the sun or shivering in the cold. The only heat comes from the oven. Your hands aren’t blackened with dirt anymore. Your shirts get specked with flour, even with an apron, and you’re almost always scrubbing it out of your nails.

Once in a while, the Cohens ask you to come up to their apartment, right on top of the bakery, and you do. You hang around Pete and his older sister, Jeanie, his kid brother, Joseph, talk for a while, and then you go home, almost always meeting Steve on the corner.

You know it’s probably not a permanent position. Know you’ll probably have to take up something real soon—clerical work and the like—but for the first time in a while, you think you feel okay.

-

‘37 comes and goes without much of a fuss. It’s just a small Christmas for everyone, and thankfully, no mistakes for New Years. In fact, you end up spending the evening with some Italian broad called Angelica. She keeps calling you Giacomo, and you hit it off just fine until you stumble into her apartment, until you make too much of a racket and get shoved, then punched in the nose by someone shouting, _pezzo di merda!_

“You never told me you live with your family!” you shout, clutching your bloody nose. A shirtless guy stares at you with furious eyes and a goddamn baseball bat.

“You never asked!” she yells back and then rounds on her brother when he mutters something in your general direction. “Vaffanculo! Lascialo in pace!”

They’re bickering at each other, getting louder and louder, Angelica’s brother pointing at her until she says something that makes him back off with an annoyed huff. “Sorry,” he says roughly, whipping his head in your direction. “For your face.”  
  
“Uh,” is all you can come up with. He storms away before you can say anything else. You sit up, wipe your nose—bruised, not broken, thank God— “I think I should go home.”

“Good idea,” Angelica says, and helps you to your feet. “Go home. Ice your pretty nose.”  
  
“Ain’t pretty when it’s got blood gushing out of it,” you say, thick, and not as clear as you’d like. You wish it sounded smoother.

“It’s only a drip,” Angelica says, and slides her arm around you before she _pinches your ass_. Christ. “Drama queen.”

“Yeah, well, this drama queen don’t want his face pounded in anymore,” you say quietly, walk to the door before you point at her and then yourself, mouthing _my place next time_.

Angelica only winks before she opens the door for you. “Goodnight,” she says, and steals a kiss from your blood smeared mouth. Pats your cheek. You let your hand linger at her waist before you pull away. “Be good.”  
  
“I’ll do my best, sweetheart,” you say, wipe your nose on sleeve again. “ _Buono notte!_ ” you call as you walk out, since it’s one of the only few words you can actually say in Italian.

-

“Christ, Buck, you gotta stop with the Italian girls,” Steve says irritably when he hands you a dishtowel filled iced. He sits down beside you heavily. Two minutes to midnight. “They’re gonna be the death of you.”  
  
You lean back on the sofa, suppress a flinch at the bite of pain spreading from your nose and into your face. “What a _sweet_ death that’d be,” you say, and Steve makes a disgusted noise.

“When did you become such a cad?” he asks.

“James Buchanan Barnes is many things but he _ain’t_ no goddamn cad,” you say. “And it’s about time you get a taste of your own medicine, anyway. I’m always helpin’ you with your scrapes.”

“Yeah, yeah, I got it, same old spiel,” Steve grumbles, and he pours you each a finger of the cheap gin from the cupboard. “Just don’t come crying to me when Angelica’s brother kicks your ass again.”  
  
“I’m bleedin’ outta my nose, stupid, not my ass,” you say, and Steve stares at you for a second before he cracks up, and you do too, laughing just because you probably shouldn’t. There’s a little shock of pain with every movement of your face, and you get stuck in a fit of it even as you say _ow, ow, ow, fuck._

You set the towel down, just for a second, and raise your glass as the clock strikes twelve. “Happy New Year to ya, Rogers,” you say, and clink in a toast with Steve before you both knock back your gin.

“Happy New Year to you too, _Giacomo_ ,” Steve says for the hundredth time since he heard Angelica call you that.

“For Chrissakes, shut up already!”

-

You don’t drink much after that. You stick to your side of the bed when it gets late, and try not to think of the last time you went out with Steve. You’re a little relieved you came back. Just a little. Maybe ‘38 will be good for both of you. Maybe you and Angelica can work out things out together. Maybe Steve can figure something out for himself, too. Finally pull his head out of his ass. 

You consider this, consider the gin burning pleasantly in your chest, and try not to consider the warmth of a body in your bed, even though a part of you knows it’s all you’ll think about until you fall asleep, especially tonight.

-

In January, you decide to apply your knack for handy work to other tenements, and even though it’s just fixing up blocked sinks and toilets and helping people move their furniture, it’s extra money on top of the bakery. You get better at baking on your own, too, and that saves you a bit of money. Makes the apartment smell like a dream when you don’t manage to burn or underbake a loaf of bread. It doesn’t even taste half bad as it begins to get a little stale.

In April, it’s tense at the bakery, and when you dip out for a smoke with Pete, he unloads. He tells you his cousins back in Poland haven’t written him in over a month, then tells you all sorts of things going on there and beyond that make your stomach turn.

There’s nothing you can offer him, no reassurances because Pete ain’t the type for that, and something about all of this is giving you a bad feeling.

-

It’s impossible not to notice after that. Like accidentally looking at your nose and finding it in your field of vision for the rest of the day.

You start paying attention to the papers, to the whispers around town. You read about the German-American Bund rallies in Long Island, in Manhattan, even in Jersey. You try not to think too much about it, even when the headlines start getting more gruesome, more detailed, even when it seems like the entire city is holding its breath, waiting for a blow that hopefully won’t come.

In the winter, Steve gets sick again, and it isn’t as bad as it was in ‘36. No pneumonia, no fevers. It’s just a cough that persists stubbornly throughout the holidays, but you still stay awake—like you always do now—counting his breaths, making sure he lasts through the night.

-

‘39 is tense, like everyone is wringing their hands in worry. Some people keep shrugging off the possibility of war, saying there’s no point for the US to get involved at all, that the Nazis are Europe’s problem, but others are less convinced, and remain even more unconvinced when twenty thousand American-born Nazis gather in Madison Square Garden.

Plenty are going to protest, to break up the rally. Pete and his sister are among them, and you yourself want to go, but you know that means Steve will want to come too, and the last thing you need is him running into Midtown, fists flying at the first Nazi he sees.

  
So, now you’re home, listening to the news about it, getting interrupted by frantic knocking on the door. “Hold your horses, I’m comin’, I’m comin’!” you call. “Don’t get your panties in a—”

Rebecca is standing in the doorway with wild hair and a torn cardigan, skinned knees and a bloodied face.

It’s like every nerve in your body is set alight, fear of the worst burning hot in your stomach, vision flashing. “Becks,” you croak, and drag her inside. “Jesus _Christ_.”

“I’m _fine_ ,” she snaps with a mouthful of blood, but she lets you sit her down on one of the dining chairs. “I’m fine, Buck, honest!”

Your heart is pounding so hard your ears ache, hands shaking with honest to God _rage_ because if someone laid a _single hand_ on her—

“Did someone hurt you?” you ask, and you bring your hands to either side of her face. “Was it your fuckin’ boyfriend?”

“What? No!” 

“Well, you gotta tell me, pal, ‘cause you’re scarin’ the shit outta me,” you say, smooth her hair back out of her eyes. Your mind is going in a hundred different directions, no matter how hard you try to focus on what to do. “You just gotta tell me what happened and I’ll do whatever I gotta do to fix it, I’ll call the police or take care of it myself or—”  
  
“Would you stop?” she says sharply, and shoves you off. “I said I’m alright!”

“Then who the fuck did this?!” you shout without meaning to.

You’re loud enough to get Steve in from the fire escape, it was decent enough weather for him to sit out there doing some of his cityscapes, the details of Red Hook. The blocky buildings, the sugar refinery, but now he’s back inside with as much spit and vinegar as you have brimming in your veins the moment his eyes land on Rebecca. 

“Was it Scott?” Steve asks, point blank. “Beck, if it was—”

“Scott’s in Hoboken this week,” Rebecca says irritably, takes the towel filled with ice, pressing it to her temple with a flinch. Her mouth works, chin jutting out like it always does when she’s angry. “I was in Midtown.”  
  
“Midtown,” you echo, and then your eyes widen. Somehow, at the same time, you and Steve blurt out, “You went to the rally?!”

“I thought you two would be there!” Becca argues, cringes when the cut on her lip opens. “There’s a sea of people out there, Buck. We were packed in like sardines and the police wouldn’t let us in, like _we_ were the ones doing wrong. It got so crazy, and—no one did this, I fell, got a face full of pavement, and a few guys shoved me out of it, said I should’ve stood home. How the hell am I supposed to stay home? What am I supposed to do? Knit?”  
  
It doesn’t ease your worries, not at all. Yes, you’re relieved that no one did this to her on purpose, but now you’re angry that she got caught in the thick of everything. Someone could have killed her, either intentionally or by trampling her down. Any of the nutjobs from that rally could have got to her. Your nails dig into your palms so painfully it feels like you might bleed.

You round back on her. “Če dinli san,” you spit. “How the hell could you run into that, huh? What if someone knocked your head in for real, or arrested you? You woulda gave Ma, woulda gave _me_ , a heart attack! How would we have found you?”

She clenches her jaw tightly, splotches of red high in her cheeks. Her eyes are wet with anger, and she doesn’t say a word, just wipes blood from the corner of her mouth.

You shake your head. “You know something,” you say as you dab a rag with antiseptic. You hear Steve filling a glass at the sink, rummaging through the cabinet for the bottle of Aspirin. You turn to him. “This is your fault.”

“ _My fault_?” Steve bursts out. “I didn’t tell her to go!”

“Yeah, but who’s always preaching about the goddamn Nazis, huh? It ain’t me, that’s for sure!”  
  
“It was me and Beth!” Becca interrupts before you two start going at it. You both whip around to look at her. “We went out there together. We didn’t plan on goin’ to protest, we were in the city for a while, and it just happened. You know they’re killing Roma in Europe, too, right? Arresting ‘em for no good reason. What if that starts happening here?”

Her voice catches on the last word, and it’s like all the air is sucked out of you, because...Christ, she’s just _scared_. Angry, too, of course, but you know your baby sister like the back of your hand.  
  
“That ain’t gonna happen,” you say quickly, as if you could fix it if it did. You sigh, swallow your anger down before you pull the other chair up to clean the cut on her lip. “We’re gonna be fine.”  
  
You can see in her eyes that she doesn’t agree, and when she cringes, you know it isn’t because her face hurts. Her eyes are brighter when they tear up, and she doesn’t make a sound when you tug her closer, rub a hand up and down her back. “We’re gonna be fine,” you say again, even though you don’t believe it. Something doesn’t feel right. “You know, Steve’s more than willing to go punch a few Germans to prove that, if you want him to.”  
  
You aren’t sure if she lets out a laugh or a sob, but it’s hot and wet against your shoulder, and you hold her tighter. “If we go to war, you’re gonna be first in line to enlist, huh, Steve?” Becca asks, muffled, and then she lifts her head, looks over at him.

“Not unless you beat me to it,” Steve says, and after he hands her the glass of water, he tugs her into a side hug. She actually laughs at that, sniffs hard, wipes her blood smeared face.

“Say, I don’t wanna sit in here crying all day,” Becca croaks. “Why don’t we do something fun?”  
  
“I dunno what your definition of fun is anymore,” you tease. “You two can go ahead if it involves getting in any scraps.”  
  
“Nah,” Becca says, and takes the rag, wipes her face off. “Cross my heart.”

“We’ll see about that,” Steve says, and bites back something like a smile when you point a finger in his face and say, “You keep your mouth shut, you damn hypocrite.”  
  
“That’s a big word, Buck, where’d ya learn that?” he asks.  
  
“Dictionary,” you say without missing a beat. “And they have a great big picture of you where the definition should be.”  
  
“You know where they got a picture of you?” Steve starts.

“Watch your mouth, Rogers,” you say. “We got a lady in the house.”  
  
“I ain’t a lady,” Becca says, still a little wet. “Now, lemme clean my face and we’ll get outta here.”

“You heard the lady, Buck,” Steve says, and when Becca elbows him hard, leaves him puffing out a curse, you can’t help laughing, even with the worry curdling your blood, it feels like being here, the three of you holed up in your apartment, might protect you from the mess to come.

-

In the end, you end up at the pictures, struggling to focus on _The Three Musketeers_ , watching Becca not-so-subtly ice her head with her drink. No matter how hard she tries, you’ll both be torn a new one. Becca for sneaking out to the rally, and you for not keeping a closer eye on here. Your argument is already on the tip of your tongue, that you can’t keep an eye on her at all times, but the truth is—

The truth is, you’re already beating yourself up about it. Had you given into the impulse to go, you would have found Becca and got her out before it turned into a mess.

You both swallow down your pride and head toward Vinegar Hill. At least her face isn’t bloodied up anymore. The lump on her head has gone down, and can probably be hidden if she styles her hair right. The cut on her lip isn’t that deep, and all the girls are wearing red lately, anyway. A little makeup might go a long way  
  
Still, when you get back home, Ma is tight-lipped and livid. Becca is behind you when you raise your hands and say, “She came by ours, and I promise you, she fell,” you say before Ma can hiss _where the hell is your sister_. “Steve and I helped her clean up as much as we could.”

Rebecca looks so young, her proud shoulders slumped as she wedges between you and Steve. Ma takes either side of her face in her hands, dark eyes wide, turning her face this way and that. “Te merav mey, Becca,” she mutters, then squeezes her shoulders— runs her hands up and down her arms. “All three of you, inside.”  
  
-

Ma says nothing as she further inspects and fixes Rebecca’s face at the kitchen table, doing a way better job than you did, tsking at the state of her scuffed dress and shoes. “Did you really fall down?” she asks, crosses her arms over her chest. “Or did you get into trouble?”

“Devel, mama, _no_ ,” Becca says, and glances at you. “I ain’t lying. Why don’t you ask Steve and Bucky? They won’t lie to you.”  
  
Which means you are absolutely going to have to cover Rebecca’s ass now. Christ. Ma turns to both of you, raises her brows.

“You know she and her friend went to the city today, right?” you ask, and Christ, if looks could kill, Becca would have you dead on the ground, but it fades as you continue. “They were racing each other for the train, and a whole crush of people came in from that rally.”  
  
“Didn’t you and your friend almost get trampled?” Steve asks Becca, and she blanches, mouth working before she continues. “Uh-huh,” she starts. “Yeah. Beth and I would have fell right onto the tracks if some fellas didn’t help us up.”

Ma looks between the three of you. “Fine,” she says. “None of you are twitching, so you must be telling some of the truth.”  
  
No one has anything to say about that. It’s as close as getting her to believe you as you can get, and thankfully, the air clears, tension slipping from the room.

-

“I’m ratting both of you out next time,” Steve says as you walk home. “Maybe you and Becca ain’t scared of Winnie, but _I_ am.”

“ _But_ she’ll believe you over us,” you quip. “And how many times have I had to lie to your poor ma, huh, Saint Steven? _No, ma’am, we were just roughhousing with the McCarthys, yes, ma’am, I swear_ —”

“All right, all _right_ , you made your point,” Steve relents, raises his hands. “Jerk.”  
  
“Punk,” you shoot back without missing a beat, and his smile is a little lopsided as you turn the corner. Your chest tightens uncomfortably.

-

Some days, you think you’ve made your peace with it. You love Steve, but you can’t have him, so some day you’ll swallow your feelings down for good and get hitched, have a couple of kids since that’s what’s expected.

But then, on other days, you can’t tear your eyes away from him. You watch the furrow to his brows, the twist to his mouth when he’s knee deep in a commission or reading, the way his eyes light up his whole face when he smiles. You drink in the delicate bones of his fingers when he sketches, when you’re bandaging bloody knuckles, or the jut of his clavicle peeking through too-big shirts, the line of every rib and every knob in his spine in the summer when he sits out on the fire escape with you.

You see all of this, and you hunger, and you think, _I don’t know how much longer I can take this_.

-

In the spring, you find an office job, sitting at a desk until your ass aches, managing books until you can’t see straight.

You hate it. The air is hot and stale, and you alternate between your excuse for a suit, and one that the Cohens actually gave you, since Pete’s younger brother had had a ridiculous growth spurt and is now a head taller than you. You’re grateful for it, and tell them so, since it got you a job.

You don’t change your opinion on that, not even when your boss goes bankrupt and you end up jobless again, not even when you end up right back where you began, kneading bread and unloading trucks and mopping floors for Mr. Cohen, constantly searching the papers and flat out going around _asking_ for work.

By the time fall comes and Brooklyn covered in red and orange leaves, you take shifts at a diner and work for the Cohens, eyes always keen to find something bigger, something that pays more.

“You think it’s somethin’ I’m doing?” you ask out of sheer frustration when you’re rejected by the third office job you apply for, relieved for the breeze on the fire escape. “Do I—” you laugh bitterly. “What, do I stink that bad?”  
  
Steve’s been uncharacteristically nice to you this week, barely teasing, almost tip-toeing around you. You might be a little grateful for it, because you’re so damn sore and self-pitying, you don’t think you have any good humor left in you.

“It’s hard for everyone, not just us,” he says, and looks away when you curl your lips around your fourth cigarette in an hour. “Lotta folks who got it a lot worse, Buck.”  
  
You grunt around your smoke. You still feel like you stink of burger grease and burnt coffee grounds. “Wish we had it better,” you mutter, puff out a cloud of smoke through your nose. “If I could hold somethin’ down, if those assholes at the WPA saw how good your work was and payed you what you deserve, we’d be able to get the hell out of here and get a nice place, not have to worry about if we can afford to fuckin’ _eat_.”

-

In a not so far away future, you’ll ache for your little matchbox of an apartment, for Steve’s scrawny elbows in your ribs, the stink of garbage in the street, the sweet smell of rugelach from the Cohens’ bakery. You’ll think of it, shaking with sickness and pain and misery, wishing you could click your heels like Dorothy from _The Wizard of Oz_ and wake up in your tiny, lumpy bed.

-

Steve starts going to Greenwich.

You hate when Steve goes to Greenwich.

You aren’t jealous, it’s not like that. You’re relieved he has other people to hang around with, since you’ve been such a louse these days, and run circles around Brooklyn working and hunting for any job that might take you, but—

_But._

They’re filling his head with radical ideas about the world and the future. He talks about it constantly, ranting about this and that and the war and Hitler and who deserves what and _yadda yadda yadda_. It’s not that you don’t agree with him, it’s just that you wish he’d stop talking about it in front of people who won’t understand. When you tell him as much, he says, _they’re gonna have to suck it up eventually, Buck, since everything’s gonna start changin’ right under our noses._

Hardee har har. You fucking wish.

Because of Steve’s new worldviews, because of the company he keeps, he gets into even worse fights than usual. He comes home with swollen black eyes and blood staining his shirts, _bootprints on his ribs,_ and it drives you insane. You can’t help wondering what he gets up to, but wondering is about all you can do, since he refuses to tell you a thing about it. When you ask to tag along, you’re told you won’t like it.

A selfish part of you wonders if he’d seethe when you went out with the guys from the docks instead of him, or when you hang around Pete or take some girl to a picture or the dance hall. Maybe he does, and maybe he doesn’t.

Or maybe it’s just you doing the seething.

However, you have good reason for it, especially when he ends up in a jail cell. When a policeman shows up at your door asking if you know a Steven Grant Rogers. Instead of blowing your top, you simply, exasperatedly ask what he did this time. If you’re good at anything, it’s sweet-talking, even if it’s a copper.

Your sweet-talk works wonders, though, and when you finally get Steve out, you’re spitting mad, but he might be angrier than you.

“So, now, you’re getting yourself arrested,” you remark on the train back, just low enough for him to hear. “Fuckin’ aces, Steve. That’s just great.”

“I know what you’re thinkin’, but I didn’t do anything,” Steve says sharply. “Can’t you let it go?”  
  
“I didn’t hear a ‘thank you’, you know,” you mutter. You shake your head, and you laugh. “Never a single goddamn ‘thank you.’”

Steve rubs his hands over his face. He looks tired, just this side of glum. “Jesus,” he huffs, and then says, a little louder. “If you’re that mad, you coulda just left me there.”  
  
“Maybe I should’ve,” bursts out of your mouth.

You both turn to face each other, brimming with anger, something like surprise, but you’re not boys anymore. You’re far from it. You’re twenty-two, Steve’s twenty-one, you can’t break into fisticuffs in public.

So, you both stay silent. For the journey back into Brooklyn, the walk home, the rest of the evening.

-

It’s half past one in the morning, and you’re out on the fire escape with another smoke and some cheap whiskey in a coffee mug.

You’re not even surprised when the window opens, and Steve sits down, wound as tight as you. Wordlessly, you pass the mug to him, and wordlessly, he takes it. You don’t look at the line of his throat as he drinks from it.

Your throat is hot and tight when you say, after what feels like hours of silence, “I’m sorry things ain’t better for us.”  
  
Steve doesn’t even look up when he says, “Me too,” but he does slide his arm around your shoulders, maybe stays close for just a hair too long, but you don’t care. You run your hand up his back, feel the knobs of his crooked spine beneath your fingers.

Your silence becomes a lot more companionable after that.

-

Soon enough, everyone is spitting mad about the fact that American weapons are being sold into the very war they never wanted to get involved in. The war you hope stays the hell out of the USA. 

“Better off leavin’ the Krauts to the French and the Brits,” you say around a mouthful of something you grabbed off a tray. It tastes vaguely fishy, and you hide your disgust as best as you can. You hate fish. “What’s goin’ on out there ain’t right, but what if we stick our noses in it and get a bomb for our troubles, huh?”

You say this to a group of people you’ve never met, when Steve finally lets you tag along to some art gallery on the Lower East Side, since one of his pieces made it in. It left him (and you) pleased as punch, and if someone wants to buy it, he might be able to make a name for himself.

Steve snorts at that. “Gee, Buck, tell us how you really feel,” he says. Someone laughs, not at you, but with the two of you.

“Oh, I will, since I already know how _you_ feel,” you say, and set your eyes on a girl with wavy black hair and lips darker than cherries. “Steve almost dragged me to that rally in February.”  
  
“Better you didn’t go,” she says into the lip of her glass. “Over one thousand people outside trying to break it up, and the coppers didn’t do a damn thing, acted like _we_ were wrong. It was a madhouse.”

The evening drones on. You don’t love all the artsy types, but these folks seem alright. One of Steve’s oils end up hanging up on a wall with all of these other new names, and then you, him, and a few others end up with a booth at Katz’s, talking till your throats are sore.

-

The girl with black hair and dark lipstick turns out to be named Lillian, and she catches you outside as you all begin to go separate ways, feigning a kiss on your cheek to say, “You should come more often. I’ve never seen Steve in such high spirits.”  
  
“Sure,” is all you can come up with, head spinning just a little.

“You look real nice together, by the way. Suit each other,” Lillian says before she pulls away, waving as she races her friends to the train station. “Goodnight, you two!”

-

It wipes your brain out entirely. 

Lillian couldn’t think you two were—of course you _knew_ a lot of the artists were queer. You just knew, like a gut feeling, or you overheard a few rumors about places in Greenwich and Brooklyn Heights being shut down or other awful things, but if anyone goes around just _saying_ things like that out loud, they could get themselves killed. It turns your stomach to ice, for too many reasons.

You know what you feel for Steve, you’re no fool about it, but thinking of everything that comes with that fills you with so much dread, you might just puke.

-

That night, you consider the idea that maybe Steve _is_ queer, he just doesn’t want you, and that hurts more than him not being queer at all.

-

You ring in 1940 at a dance hall, with lipstick on your collar and your head spinning with too much gin. You wake up at some dame’s (Louise? Lucille?) house. It’s still dark out, and your mouth tastes rotten. Your fingers smell like they always do after you make time with a girl, and she has love bites on between her thighs. 

It was probably a good night, you just don’t remember it.

When you get home, clothes in disarray, Steve is still asleep, half buried underneath the quilt, breath whistling ever so slightly and _God_ , you’re so cold and so damn achingly lonely that you crawl in bed with your clothes on, kicking off your shoes, and shiver at the burst of heat, the bed warmed from his body.

You’re slipping your arm around him before you even realize it, and your breath catches when he tugs you closer, all the weight on your shoulders melting when you fit your body up against his, tangle your legs up.

“You stink. Like perfume,” Steve mutters. “Bad perfume.”

You hum in response, and in your brain, it counts as a laugh. Your eyes are already shut, thoughts spiraling away. “Shuddup ‘n sleep, huh?” you whisper, muffled against his neck, breathing in washing powder and soap and sweat.

If he hears you, you aren’t sure, but you swear you can feel his thumb smoothing against the jut of your wrist as you tumble into a fitful sleep.

-

In the morning, you wake nose to nose with Steve, and with his arm slung over your neck. Your gin-addled brain comes to the thought of what Lillian said back in November, and you think to yourself that for a while, you can pretend her assumption was right.

It’s only for a little while, anyway.

-

The headlines get worse. Men give up their citizenship and move to Canada to enlist in the fight against the Axis. It’s all people talk about now, despite how much they say they don’t want a war. That they don’t want their brothers, fathers, husbands, sons, to become cannon fodder. The Great War left so many men shells of themselves, they don’t want anyone else to face the same fate.

And then, in the fall, it turns out the good ol’ U-S-of-A wants to get involved after all.

It sends everyone into a frenzy. A draft during peacetime. But is it really peacetime? The war overseas has been breathing down everyone’s necks, waiting to strike, and now the time is finally coming.

When you and Steve get your numbers, your ears ring deafeningly. Ma and Rebecca look at you like your death certificates have already been signed.

-

“You know,” Steve says, while you’re both half-listening to the World Series. It doesn’t matter if you pay attention, it’s the bottom of the seventh and the Reds are eight points behind. Unless a goddamn miracle happens, they won’t win. They’re not your team, but you like them just fine. “My dad didn’t even get killed by the enemy. That’s what my ma told me, long while back.”  
  
“Steve,” you start, stomach twisting strangely. In the back of your mind, you recall a dream about a man you’d never even seen before. “Pal, what are you talking about?”  
  
“It was mustard gas,” Steve says. He huffs a bitter laugh. For just a second, he’s the spitting image of Sarah Rogers. “They made it past enemy lines, him and a few other guys, and Ma said the brass knew, and they didn’t even _care_ , Buck. What was four guys compared to the thousands of others in the trenches? They gave him a medal for choking to death, like he...like he planned on dying that day.”

“Well, that’s what they _do_ ,” you say. Recently, because of everything happening, Ma spilled a few stories. Told you how your Pop watched his buddy become a mess of blisters and burns, and cry and say _Barnes, please, I can’t go home like this_ , so Pop shot him. Put him out of his misery as the gas cleared. “Everyone ends up becomin’ dog food out there. You think the brass cares about the little guy? Come on, Steve.”

Steve shakes his head, jaw working. “They throw whoever they think ain’t important into the goddamn meat grinder and solve it all themselves,” he says sharply. “Talk it out in some little room away from the action. Those guys out there are dying as a distraction while Churchill and the rest figure it out. Don’t sound like they care.”

“‘Cause they don’t,” you say. “And they never will.”

-

Two weeks later, your number is drawn in the lottery, and you feel like the ground has dropped from under your feet. It feels like being a kid and spinning around for too long, feeling the world tip around you, stomach cold and slick.

A day after that, Steve’s number comes up.

-

They take you, right off the bat. 

You’re tall, you’re healthy, your record is clean as a whistle, your pop served before. They want to send you out to Fort McCoy for training by the end of next week.

They don’t take Steve, thank God or the devil or whoever the fuck is listening to your prayers, _they don’t take him_. You wish they stamped his 4F on his damn forehead so he doesn’t do anything stupid. So, everyone in all five boroughs knows not to let him in.

-

Later that night, after you tell Ma and Becca you’ve been accepted, you go home and throw up everything in your stomach. You spend the evening hunched over a bucket, sick with your lies. You told them, _it’s just for the year. We probably won’t see any combat at all. For all I know, I’ll end up being a cook._

They believe you, but Steve doesn’t. Not for a second. Neither of you are foolish enough to think this will just blow over.

“Like hell you’re going out there alone, Buck,” Steve says firmly. You groan, stomach twisting into knots when he rests his hand between your shoulder blades. “I’m comin’ with you, and I don’t care how I get there.”

That brings on another wave of nausea, because what if the brass gets desperate? What if they do take him, after all? 

“I pity that Kraut that looks at you the wrong way,” you croak, and make a sound, wet and thick, in the back of your throat. You might be laughing, but you aren’t completely sure. “Hell, I pity the whole damn Axis.”

You don’t tell him you don’t want him there. You don’t want yourself there either. If you had it all your way, you’d chuck your dog tags into the East River, burn your enlistment form, and skip town with Steve in tow.

-

Grand Central Station is a nightmare. A crush of people, and more men and boys than you could imagine jumping onto trains, kissing their sweethearts and their families and their children goodbye with promises to be back home for good by next October. _It’s only a year_ , you try to remind yourself. One year of serving, and then you can go back home, pretend all of it was some kind of horrible dream.

But, a lot can happen in a year. Everything could change at the drop of a hat.

On the platform, Ma and Becca hug you tight like they’ll never see you again. “You’re gonna write us, aren’t you, Buck?” Becca asked, arms tight around your neck, leaving you a little short on air. You squeeze her back just as tight. “Every single day, I don’t wanna miss a single word you send out.”

“‘Course I’m gonna write.” You don’t know how your voice is so steady. You’re grateful for it. “Gotta tell someone about the slop I’m eating out there.”

She laughs wetly against your shoulder before she pulls away. “You know I love you, right?” she says, and your chest feels impossibly hollow. 

You wave a hand at her. “Nah, couldn’t tell by that hug.”

Steve is next, and it’s tighter than you expect. Your chin hits his shoulder, and you feel his hand drop something into your pocket, feel him squeeze you for just a second before he pulls back. “I gotta agree with Becca, don’t slack on writing,” he says.  
  
“I won’t if you won’t.” You want to tug him in again, and you can see his hands twitch, body still lingering close by. Maybe too close. There’s more he wants to say, but he’s keeping his mouth shut. You wish there was time for him to spit it out. “Send me some sketches or somethin’, whatever floats your boat.”

You try not to let your gaze linger, and suddenly, you feel very stifled in your uniform. Your collar is too tight around your throat, your shoes painful and squeezing your feet. When you turn to your Ma you expect her to be weepy like Becca but she isn’t. She’s tense all over, but she raises her eyebrows at you.

“Well, are you just gonna stand there or are you gonna hug your mother?” she asks with feigned sternness, and something close to a smile comes to her lips. “Do I have to?” you shoot back, before you tug her in, surprised when she squeezes you tight.

“Arakh, avel palpale,” she says close to your ear. She pulls you back to take your face into cold, slender hands. “Hal’arel? You’ll come back to us, Yasha.”  
  
“Yes, ma’am,” you say through your half-squished face, and she kisses you on the cheek just as the train comes up to the platform. “‘M sure I’ll get back for Christmas, too.”  
  
“From your lips to God’s ears,” Ma says quickly, smooths your jacket before she lets go, crosses her arms tight. “Go, quick, you’ll miss your train.”

“Yes, ma’am,” you repeat. You don’t think you can say much else, anyway. You salute her. You kiss Becca’s cheek. You ruffle Steve’s hair just to wipe that glowering look off his face and get him to smile at you, and then you’re jogging to the train with your suitcase, jumping in with your ticket, the train horn blaring through your ears.

Somehow, you force your way to a window seat and do what the other guys are doing, waving out the window to your little family on the platform. You shout _I love you!_ but you’re not sure if they hear it.

You sit back in your chair, digging into your pocket and feeling your chest swell, eyes growing hot when you feel the cold, familiar weight of your pocket watch in your palm. You dig it out fast, leaning forward into your seat, and let your eyes go all over it like it’s new all over again.

Of course, Steve wouldn’t let you leave without a part of him coming along.

You almost lose it completely, the reality of where you’re headed setting in, and then you’re tapped on the shoulder by another guy in uniform, a little older than you are. “Someone sitting here?” he asks.

“No,” you manage to say, scooting back. “All yours.”

He plops down on the seat across from you and promptly sets his cap over his face, crosses his arms, and goes to sleep. You’re relieved, relieved you can’t let the torrent of what you feel out into the open. You clutch the watch in your left hand, thumb running over the engravings, like it’s some precious thing. It is, you realize.

Your eyes are open for the rest of the journey, and as the city whizzes past you, turns to fields and trees and blurs of red and orange and yellow, a sight that makes you wish Steve were sitting beside you so you could ask him to sketch it, you think, as if the whole state of New York can hear you, _I’ll be back soon._

END OF PART ONE


	2. PART II: 1940-1945

_Dear Family,_

_Well, it looks like we’re getting leave after all. Didn’t I say I’d be back for Xmas? Maybe I would do well with gambling after all, ha ha ha._

_Rebecca_ _—I’m so happy to hear you want to go to college! Someone in this family has to, and you’ve got more brains than I do anyhow. I insist you tell me all about it when I get back (_ _Dec. 20th!_ _). We’ll have a ball, I promise._

_Ma—thanks for the socks, I really needed them, and sorry for the scare in my last letter. Kickback from a rifle is a real pain in the neck (very literally), but I am doing fine now. Looking forward to Xmas and helping you with dinner. My pay might be good enough to get us something real nice to eat. Missing you both, looking forward to coming home._

_Yours,_

_Cpl. J.B. Barnes_

_-_

_Dear Steve,_

_I am going to assume you have already heard I’ll be home for Xmas, but if not, I’ll get to see you for a whole nine days before I head back. There’s been an awful lot of snow, and it makes training a little difficult, makes ▇▇▇▇ very difficult, but apparently I’m a natural. That’s what they tell me, at least, but holy cow is it beautiful out here. It looks like something out of a postcard, or like living inside of a snowglobe. I wish you could see it._ _  
__  
__How are you? How’s work? Tell me everything. I could use it to pass the time. I might be home by the time your letter arrives, but write me anyway. You won’t see me complaining about it._

_Let’s have some fun when I get back, okay? Maybe we can go into the city again and hang around Rockefeller Center. You can draw me while I try to ice skate and fall flat on my face._

_I know this is short, but know I am looking forward to seeing you and am hoping you’re doing well._

_Sincerely, your pal,_

_Bucky_

_-_

Coming back home on the 20th is a big fat lie. You actually arrive on the 19th, a little past eight ’o clock. 

You take the subway into Brooklyn and even though you’ve been on a train for days now, you’ve missed it, because the train ride to and back from Fort McCoy just wasn’t the same. The rumble under your feet, the rush in your ears, the not-so-sweet smell of home is where it’s really at.

People smile at you. Men say you’re doing the right thing. There are a few other soldiers around, too, lingering around the station, looking as relieved as you feel. Once you get off at Carroll Street, you walk the familiar route to Red Hook, loving the briskness in the air. It was colder in Wisconsin, and you never thought that anything could be worse than a New York winter until you found yourself there.

It snowed here, too, evidently. Your type of snow, though. Grey and slushy and piled on the streets. The sharpness of the cold lodges in your nose, the fishy stench from the docks wafting in as you get closer to home, bringing a sense of urgency to your bones. 

As awful as it sounds, you want a little time to yourself, just a day to prepare yourself before the holidays really begin.

So you sneak up the creaky stairs of your tenement, comforted by the lingering scent of cigarette smoke, of Mr. O’Leary’s cabbage stew, the dampness of laundry, the sound of the Gillespies’ grandkids stomping around and shrieking away. A radio is playing somewhere, and it’s—

It’s coming from your apartment, which means Steve is home.

 _Steve is home_ , and your chest swells with something giddy and excited. You jog up the last few stairs, banging hard on the door with your fist and biting down on your lower lip to keep from grinning.

“Police!” you bark, your voice deep in your chest. “Open up or the door’s coming down!”

Nothing, and then rapid, stomping footsteps before the door swings open. “Officer, I think you got the wrong _—_ ”

Steve’s eyes turn to saucers when he lays eyes on you, and he pales, then goes red, then redder before a laugh catapults out of his mouth, a rare grin plastering itself on his face. “Jesus _Christ_ ,” he gasps, and tugs you inside. You kick the door shut. You feel more than a little choked up, even though it’s only been a couple of months. 

It’s the longest you’ve ever spent away from him.

When you hug him, your cap falls to the floor. His bony shoulder digs into your throat, and you don’t even mind it. “Nah, sorry to disappoint you,” you say thickly, breathing in the familiar smell of him—turpentine and soap and washing powder, so simple but so inherently _Steve_. “It’s just your old pal.” 

“I can make do with that,” Steve says. You can feel his voice, low and deep inside of you. Maybe it’s ridiculous to think, but you thought you were the only one feeling the thread holding you two together, tugging harder and more painfully the further you got from Brooklyn. Steve’s felt it, too.

When you finally let go, you’re surprised to find that you’re both a little weepy, but neither of you point it out. 

“I thought you were coming tomorrow,” Steve says quickly as he runs his hand over his eyes, then over his hair. He looks better than you expected. Not sick. Seems like he’s been sleeping alright. Not any skinnier, meaning he’s got enough money, thank Christ. Maybe he got a raise, or found a second gig. “That’s what Winnie and Becca told me.”  
  
“Yeah,” you chuckle, and pick up your cap, shrug your coat off and set both on the hook by the door. “‘Cause that’s what I told _them_. I didn’t get you a present, so I thought I’d surprise you.”

You don’t get this expression from him often, it’s like you’ve said the sweetest thing in the world to him, and he looks at you like that thing just might be _you_. Steve laughs quietly, and all but pins you in place with his gaze.

“It’s one hell of a present, I’ll tell you that,” he says. “Almost gave me a heart attack.”  
  
“Do I clean up that nice?” you ask teasingly. “You gonna whistle at me, too?”  
  
“Sure am.” There’s a wicked grin on Steve’s face, and then he puts his thumb and forefinger between his lips and _wolf-whistles_ at you.

You put a hand over your chest. “Well, don’t you know how to make a girl blush,” you say, then worry at your lower lip for a moment. “You up for a drink?”  
Steve grabs his jacket. “I thought you’d never ask,” he jokes. “Get your coat, soldier.”  
  
You do, pulling your cap back on, and shout, “That’s Corporal Barnes to you!” as you follow him down the stairs, a newfound spring in your step.

-  
  


It’s beers at Odie’s and then chop suey at some new Chinese place in Brooklyn Heights, then walking around for a while, reacquainting yourself with home, and as you walk, you let Steve fill you in on everything you’ve missed. 

He’s had a flood of commissions coming in, and working with the WPA is much more demanding than it was made out to be, but he likes it just fine, likes that his work is getting out there and getting seen by people who could end up helping him out. In more mundane news, Mr. O’Leary got married last month and his new bride moved in with him, but all they do is argue. 

“So, you might not get a good night’s sleep ‘cause of them. I know I haven’t.”

Busy, busy, busy, is the gist you get from Steve, and that’s exactly what he says. He says he’s keeping busy. He also says he has dinner at your Ma’s every Sunday, goes to mass with her and Rebecca. That part’s strange. You know he never goes to church anymore, not unless it’s a holiday, but you keep your mouth shut about it.

When you get back home, you’re full, drunk, and more content than you’ve been in a long while.

-

As expected, going home is loud and a little emotional, but you’re glad you had the first night to yourself and Steve. You show up in your uniform, since that’s what you’re expected to wear, since you’re supposed to have arrived today. 

You clutch Ma and Becca in either arm, or maybe, they clutch you. You say, _come on, ladies, there’s plenty of me to go around_ , and then they reluctantly let go, like you might disappear if they stay away too long.

It’s like that for a couple of days, and then the chaos ebbs away. On Christmas, you ditch your uniform for the day, and it’s like nothing has changed at all. Ma seems a little older, and so does Rebecca—still nineteen, but so much more of a woman than you remember.

There’s food that you end up helping with. You loosen your tie and hang your jacket over a chair, and slice up onions and cloves of garlic and the herbs that grow by the windowsill, trim the fat on pork. It’s three of you shuffling around a far-too cramped kitchen, with Steve hanging in the doorway, since the guy can’t even boil water without messing it up.

“How’ve you been coping without me cooking, huh?” you tease, a genuine grin splitting your face as you rinse your hands of the garlic stench as best you can. “Don’t tell me you learned how.”  
  
“Your cooking ain’t as good as you think it is,” Steve shoots back, and that’s a goddamn _lie_. You know you’re a good cook. “And I’m gettin’ by with what I actually know how to make.”

“Yeah, well, I’ll give you one try while I’m here, and if you disappoint me, you’re toast,” you say. “When my CO finds me losing my lunch on the track and yells, ‘Barnes! Mind explaining why you look like you’ve swallowed a handful of nails?’ I’m gonna tell him it was all my pal’s fault, that he tried to poison me to get me out of the army.”  
  
With that, you do a mean impression of Drill Sergeant Cahill, gruff, cigarette-strained voice and all. It cracks through the annoyance on Steve’s face, and Becca chuckles, says, “You gotta tell us everything about Fort McCoy, I bet you’ve got a gaggle of stories.”  
  
Steve mouths _asshole_ at you, and a slow smile creeps up his mouth.

-

The presents you receive are better than you could hope for. There are things you need, like good wool socks and long underwear, and then there a couple of chocolate bars to hide from the other guys, a good deck of cards, a big carton of Lucky Strikes.

You feel a little rotten when you don’t give anyone else back much. You managed to sneak away and buy Steve a small, leather bound sketchbook, Rebecca a pretty little pendant you found at the secondhand shop and bartered with the owner about until you got it down to a fair price, and Ma a new dress, since she deserves something nice. 

It’s all on the army’s dime, anyway. No skin off your nose. You wouldn’t have minded if it was, but it’s kind of fun, spending what they pay you on whatever you damn well please.

You aren’t sure how you’re going to go back to Wisconsin, or ship out now. Maybe nine days was too much. You’re getting your bearings again, and you feel like the brass might have to drag you back by your ankles to get you back.

Right now, you couldn’t agree more with your fellow men. _O.H.I.O_. 

By the end of ‘41, you’ll be home free.

-

It all passes too fast. On the 29th, you’re back at the train station, but it’s the middle of the day this time. Ma is at work, Rebecca is at school. You said your goodbyes the night before, anyway, and maybe it’s better, not letting either of them see you’re not too keen on leaving again. That will only make things worse for them, but if you can be honest with anyone, it’s Steve, and he’s the one who sees you off.

“You don’t think they’re gonna send you into combat yet, do you?” Steve asks, and you _know_ that’s worry, as much as he pretends it isn’t.

“Just about finished with Basic,” you say simply, shove your hands in your pockets, feel the weight of the pocket watch in the left one. “So, I don’t know. I really don’t know, Steve.”  
  
His jaw works, like it did the last time you were on the platform with him, and his words seem stuck in his throat. You use it to your advantage, taking the watch out and dropping it into his palm, closing both your hands around it.

“Buck, what are you doing?” he asks, and his voice sounds tired, even though his face is wide awake, drawn tight. “I sent this with you ‘cause it’s yours.”  
  
“Yeah, I _know,_ and I ain’t returning it,” you say, and let go, not wanting anyone—especially Steve—to notice how long you’re touching. “I love this thing, I always did, and that’s why I wanna leave it here. I had it while you were—” you try to think of a way to phrase it. A way that doesn’t let your secret out. You huff, force a smile on your face. “I need some part of me here, you know? Something close to home.”  
  
“I wish I was coming with you,” Steve says.  
  
“I don’t,” you say, try to force some lightness into your expression. “I gotta have someone to hold down the fort, keep their eyes peeled while I’m away.”

“Bucky, I’m serious,” Steve snaps, and, yeah, he is. You almost wish he was a little taller, a little less sick. but...no you don’t. If everything ends up going to hell, you don’t want him out there. “If all this means we’re really joining the war, then I—”  
  
The train horn blares through your ears, and the station quickly grows more frenzied. You both look toward each other like it’s a gunshot ringing out. “Look, just don’t worry about it right now, alright?” you say quickly. “We’re not joining up, We’re just doing our part for now. Come October, we’re done.”  
  
Neither of you believe that, but neither of you say it out loud.

You tug him in for a hug, and it’s faster for both of you this time. Like ripping off a Band-Aid. You feel like it’ll be much longer this time, until you see him again.

“That’s my cue,” you say, and the train is boarding. You walk backwards from him. “Quit trying to enlist, you hear me!”  
  
“We’ll see what happens!” Steve shouts back, waving you off. You wave back, and then you allow yourself to be crushed into the crowds of civilians and soldiers alike, all lined up at the platform and then bottlenecking at the entrance, you at the very edge of it.

You’re about to step up, ticket in hand, when you hear, “Bucky, wait!”

Steve is a blond blur when he comes running up, wheezing ever so slightly. Someone glances in your direction, but you pay them no mind, set a hand on Steve’s shoulder when he does the same to you. “Woah. I’m still here, pal,” you say. “And I’m real sorry, but you gotta make it fast.”  
  
He looks at you for a long moment, something raw and naked in his expression, fingers tightening and loosening against your shoulder. You’re brimming with anticipation, and you don’t even know why.

“Steve?” you ask, feeling him take a step forward with you, and then remove his hand.  
  
“Just be careful, alright?” he says, breathless. “Keep in touch.”

You smile at him, both relieved and disappointed, but you salute him the same way you would your CO, and get on the train.

-

Training becomes even more grueling, if that’s possible. 

It’s more courses to run, hand-to-hand sparring that gets real bloody, real fast. It’s looking through a scope in a blizzard, dressed in a white snowsuit, firing at targets you can barely see but hit anyway. You pass it all with top marks and joints that burn for days. Your hands become even more rough than they did at the docks, with hard white callouses on your palms and trigger finger. 

Cahill speaks to the higher-ups about you, surprisingly, and says you’d do better with more training as a marksman, since you’re a crack shot more than anything else. They agree with him. Better off. The longer you can stay on American soil, the better.

Letters come, and you read them as much as you can, since you don’t have much time to respond aside from the short, curt letters you find time to send. Steve sends you sketches and Becca sends you pictures she takes with her new camera. 

You miss home like a limb now. Before, it was a hollow, pinching feeling somewhere in the back of your stomach, and now it’s like a white-hot poker driven into your sternum, burning your insides to a crisp.

-

The snow slowly but surely begins to melt, and you turn twenty-four in the midst of your training, receiving letters and cards and nothing for a while, not until Easter, until you’re reading Ma’s letter and _Jesus, Mary, and Joseph_ , Rebecca and Scott are engaged to be married. Married! You should have known it was coming, should have known they were that dopey for each other. And, at least Scott got a 4F, which means he won’t have to leave Becca on her own in case something big happens.

No rush for the wedding yet, so maybe, just maybe, you might get to show up.

-

By April, you’re shipping out to Greenland, since everyone’s all whipped up about it, thinking the krauts are going to come stomping in any day and take it for themselves. It’s a hell of a lot of work getting there, trains twisting through the Canadian countryside, and spending two days in Montreal. You’re able to sneak away and walk around downtown, and find some little deli that smells incredible. You eat a sandwich that seems as big as your head, then walk around for a while, smoke three cigarettes, and breathe in the smell of the city.

It’s not exactly like home, but it’s just enough of the same to make your chest twinge. 

Luckily, you’re not allowed to think on it for much longer, because you board another train soon enough, and then a boat, and the air grows a little colder on the water, and even colder after that. 

That’s when you see the glaciers, see the patches of snow on the docks when you land, and make it to the base.

You lean in close to Burke, a guy with hair so blond it almost looks yellow. “I thought it’d be green,” you say quietly, and he sniggers.

“Wait till you hear about Iceland, Buck,” he says. Burke’s smart, spent three years in college and thinks he knows everything because of it.

“What the hell’s that supposed to mean?”

-

The months blend into each other, and it grows a little warmer as June creeps in. It’s boring as all hell, but it’s not the line of fire. 

_Not yet_ , you remind yourself, because you know it can’t be this simple. Alternating between sitting on your ass and patrolling, between eating in a mess hall with American and Greenlandic GIs and doing target practice until the kickback doesn’t even affect you anymore. Your bones itch with the need to keep busy, but you force yourself to swallow it down. You occupy your time with trying to write Steve back, since his letter arrived three days ago and you haven’t even bothered to read it over again. 

You do your best to describe the massive glaciers that seem to glow blue sometimes, and the cold and aurora borealis you saw a few nights ago. You tell him that as much as you hate fish, you think you’re being forced to like it due to how much you eat it here.

You tell him he’d like it. The hills and mountains and clean, dry air that would be good for his lungs, that it all looks like something out of a postcard. You tell him you want him to paint it for you when you get back, and you’ll stand over his shoulder and tell him just how to get it right.

What you don’t tell him is that you miss him terribly and you’re worried you might forget what he looks like if you stay away any longer. That some crazy part of you is willing to jump into a dinghy and keep rowing until you see The Statue of Liberty.

-

‘Over The Hill In October’, your hairy _ass_.

-

Somehow, you’re recommended for a promotion by Captain Andrews —who apparently likes you more than you thought he did—and the brass _agrees_ , requesting that you come back to Fort McCoy, and goddamn it, you never thought you’d be relieved to go back, but you are.

You leave Greenland on November 30th, and you’re back in Wisconsin by December 6th, appointed as Sergeant James Barnes of the 107th Infantry the very same day. 

You feel more than a little prideful, and Ma would smack you for that, you know it, but all that time dawdling in Greenland, and you rose up in the ranks. Who would have thought? 

When you settle back into the barracks with a bunch of fresh new faces, you think about the next few weeks, think about how you might get Christmas at home, might get to see everyone and see Becca’s ring, spend a few days eating the food you missed, and maybe, you’ll be able to get away for longer than a week. Maybe you’ll get a month.

You sleep soundly for the first time in weeks.

-

The next day, all hopes of that are gone, sinking like the remains of the _USS West Virginia_.

-

“It looks like you have two options, Sergeant Barnes,” Major Ives says three days later. Everyone is still reeling from the attack, with the fact that the U.S. has now officially joined the war, and all you can think of how bloody it’s going to be. Ives leans back in his chair. “Your year of service ended in October, but you opted to stay in Greenland instead. Technically, you could hang up your hat and go back home. Where’s that again?”  
  
“New York, sir,” you say, suddenly feeling completely out of your depth. “Brooklyn.”  
  
“So, you can go back to Brooklyn and let everyone else deal with the Japanese, or you can continue serving,” Ives says. “God knows we’ll need men like you out there in the field when the time comes—good, competent men—and if you agree, you’ll be ready to handle your own unit come April.”

It’s a punch to the gut. You could go home. You could go home and never look back, but if America’s really in the thick of it now, how will people see you? Will they see you as a deserter? How will the guys in the barracks, the guys in your current unit, who are no doubt planning to reenlist themselves, see you? You want to say you don’t care, want to say yes, you’re finished for good, but you don’t.

God help you, you don’t.

“Can I think it over?” you ask, wringing your hands behind your back.

Ives doesn’t look up from his folder when he says, “I’ll give you three hours.”

You give him a stiff salute, thank him, and take your leave.

-

In an ideal world, you hang up your uniform and go home, find a good job, and get back to your life. You’ll be there to walk Rebecca down the aisle, and maybe you’ll swallow down your fears and either get married yourself or finally think of what to do with your feelings concerning Steve.

In this world, you finish your training and find yourself in Nóumea right after your twenty-fifth, surrounded by hundreds of GIs, crystal clear oceans, and weather so warm, you feel it in your bones. Someone tells a French girl in a tavern that it’s your birthday, even though it passed three days ago, and you just about lose it when she kisses you full on your beer-drunk mouth, when she says _joyeux anniversare, beau_ in your ear. 

Christ Almighty, you can’t remember the last time you’ve even _seen_ a woman.

“Look what happened to sarge! He forgot how to talk!” Milton laughs.

Your new French pal laughs and weaves her way from your group as you call “I can’t even know your name?” over shouts of _he’s in love already_ and _it’s so sweet I could puke_. “I can’t speak French, but I know other languages! Mio angelo! Mio caro! Torna da me!”  
  
She laughs harder, covering her mouth with both her hands, and because you’re so gone already, you start shouting out Romanes, too. “Če šukar san! Muro papuša!” Luckily, no one pays it any mind, but even though the girl probably doesn’t understand it, she comes back over anyway.

“I speak English, silly,” she says with an accent that makes your insides churn pleasantly. She stands up tall, chin in the air. “And my name is Bernadette.”

You slap your hand to your chest. “Well, if that ain’t the most beautiful name I ever heard,” you say over the noise, and stand up. “Sergeant James Barnes, at your service.”

-

There’s the slightest wobble in your step as you walk Bernadette home, but you regain your footing relatively quickly as you walk and talk with her. When you reach the door of her building, she asks if you’d like to come inside, and since it’s been so damn long, you say _yes ma’am, I would_.

Bernadette’s apartment is as tiny as yours and Steve’s, and smells of cigarettes and potpourri. She has a wireless in the kitchen, and a bottle of brandy that’s sweeter than you expect, running down your throat pleasantly.

It’s even sweeter when she licks a dribble of it from your chin, and kisses you even better than the girls back home do. “Bernadette,” you mutter when she straddles your lap and shoves you back against her rickety bed, her hair—long and dark and curly—covering either side of your head when she leans down to kiss you again. You wrap a strand of it around your finger and tug her closer. “You’re a girl after my own heart.”

-

“I swear to God,” Mazzello says. “Come the end of the war, Barnes is gonna stow that French broad away in his suitcase and take her back to New York with him.”  
  
“He might have to marry her if she ends up with a little bun in the oven!” Milton cackles.

“Now, is that any way to talk about a lady? And someone who outranks you, Private Milton?” you bark without letting your expression crack up, angling your face up to the sun. It’s hot enough that you’ve come to sit on the beach, a few icy cold bottles of beer between the three of you, and your shirts folded behind your heads. “‘Sides, what Bernie and I get up to ain’t none of your goddamn business.”  
  
“ _Bernie_?” Mazzello echoes, then barks a laugh. “Bucky and Bernie Barnes! Jesus, what a pair!”  
  
You laugh at that without really meaning to. Bernie’s a sweet girl, three years your junior, and a spitfire, too. If you come back from this mission, maybe you’ll force yourself into marrying her, since you might not mind it so much. You’ve been in Nóumea for about two months, and you’ve been hanging around her almost the entire time, alternating between spending nights at her apartment and bunking with the other GIs.

It’s a welcome change. You like being around her. Like not hanging around a bunch of guys now that you have other options. Bernie’s pretty private, though. All you know is that she’s lived here her whole life, but she wants to travel and become a photographer for magazines like Vogue one day. 

You let her take some pictures of you, for what she says is practice. She tilts your head this way and that, and tells you how to pose, and you’re reminded of the few times Steve asked you to pose for him, how he hissed _will you quit moving_ and _I swear to God, you’ve got a bug in your ass, Buck_.

There are some of you in your dress uniform, of you stripped to your shirtsleeves, and then one of you in her bed, lighting a cigarette and wearing far, _far_ less than you were in the other pictures. You ask to borrow a couple of outtakes from when she shot you in uniform, since she doesn’t add all of them to her portfolio. She lets you use her camera to take pictures of the beach, and you slip them into envelopes along with your letters to Ma, Becca, and Steve (who’s tried to enlist _four times_ , the rat bastard).

Bernadette tells you about her mother and father, who passed a few years back. About her sister, who married and moved to Paris, and how she hopes she’s alright out there, since the war is beginning to heat up in Europe.

You tell her about home and your own family, tell her about Coney Island and how pretty Manhattan looks when it snows, all laced with imaginary plans about what you’d do there together. You tell her you’d take her dancing and make her ride the Cyclone till she pukes, and you both laugh for a good long while.

It’s not all fun and games, though. There are battle plans being made, preparations for heading to the Solomon Islands, which are already ridden with plenty of Brits and Americans and Aussies, fighting against the Japanese. Soon enough, your unit will have to head in, and you’ll have to kiss Nóumea and Bernadette goodbye.

“Write to me if you’re able,” Bernadette says during your last night together. You’re still a little breathless, body heavy and warm, your head lying against the softness of her stomach. Her fingers slide over your hair, nails rasping against your scalp, and you shut your eyes, allow yourself to enjoy it. “I’d like to hear from you sometimes.”

“Long as you write me back, angel,” you reply, feeling far too relaxed. You’ve been here too long. Gotten too comfortable. It isn’t good. “It’ll help pass the time.”  
  
Bernadette lets out a slow breath. You watch the way her chest rises and falls with it. “Perhaps this was a good way to pass the time, too,” she says, hand still moving through your hair. “For both of us.”

“Hm,” is all you can say. You kiss the spot above her navel, press your nose against smooth, clean skin before you let her tilt your chin up. “If you ever come back, maybe I’ll come to America with you,” she says.  
  
“That so?” you ask, a slow smile creeping up your mouth. “You know, we got Vogue, too. Maybe while you’re travelling, we’ll meet in the middle.”  
  
“Ride your Tornado until we get sick,” Bernadette says, and it breaks the heaviness creeping into the room. When you laugh, she smacks you in the head, and says something in French that must be _fuck you_ when you manage to get _it’s called the Cyclone, Bern_ out.

-

“How do you say it again?” you ask. “Bien-too.”  
  
“ _Non,_ ” Bernadette laughs. “À bien _tôt_.”

“À bientôt,” you echo and she smiles. Your tongue just can’t seem to curl around French right. “À bientôt, Bernadette,” you say, and kiss her on the cheek, for maybe a second too long. “It’s been a real ball.”

“À bientôt, James,” Bernadette says, and gives you a little shove to get you going. You walk backward away from her apartment, salute when she waves at you. The sun is just kissing the horizon, and when you finally turn around, you hoist your bag higher on your shoulder, break into a jog toward the docks.

-

The Solomon Islands might be the most beautiful place you’ve ever seen, but after a week, you’re sticky with sweat and ripe with mosquito bites. You’re tired and waterlogged, and almost get your throat slit by a Japanese soldier while you’re taking a leak.

That same night, you kill your first man. You drive your pocket knife into his neck and cut and stab until he gurgles and stops breathing completely. Even though your hands don’t shake, the rest of your body does, for hours upon hours.

-

To call Operation Pestilence carnage would be an understatement. 

Half the Allied soldiers are beheaded or scalped, mutilated or torn apart by explosives, and the other half don’t even die from being killed by the enemy. They die of malaria and dysentery and gangrene and infected wounds. The ones that live end up just as bad. Their lips are cracked with dehydration, ribs jutting out, tanned nut brown or sunburnt to all hell.

By July, you’ve lost a lot of weight. Your stomach is constantly empty and hungry, sick of eating coconut and mango and tuna, even though it tastes miles better than your own rations, than the ones you stole from the Japanese. 

The things you’ve gained aren’t so good, either. Scars from bullets and knives, and so much blood on your hands you doubt they’ll ever feel clean again.

-

An ambush turns into a massacre. It leaves Milton, Mazzello, Franklin, and so many other men dead. You’re covered in their blood, and as explosions and gunshots ring out, there’s no choice but to hide in your foxhole—alone now, save for the bullet ridden corpse of Admiral Tucker, rotting beside you. You feel like you’ve been buried with him, like the Japanese are shoveling dirt over your head rather than shooting at you.

Tucker’s last moments keep echoing through your head. His throat gushing blood as you did your best to stem the flow. "You a man of faith, Sergeant?" he gurgled out.

"Born and raised Catholic, sir," you croaked. Your hands were slippery with his blood. Unable to get a grip on his neck. Sand was flying all over, chafing your face up.He coughed out a glob of blood. Some of it splattered on your face.

“Then say a prayer for us.”

You did, and you’re still muttering it, though it’s turned from a Hail Mary to you frantically muttering _Áve Marī́a_ over and over and over like a broken record. You must be imagining the way your heartbeat skips, leaves your head spinning, but maybe it’ll give out before you get blown to bits. You hope it does.

You feel the explosions in your bones, in your teeth, in your fingernails. When a hand with only two fingers left falls into your foxhole, and you recognize it as Milton’s, you learn that it’s possible to piss yourself and shit your pants at the same time.

-

You don’t speak for hours, not even when Stan and Gene, two privates from your unit, drag you out of the foxhole. After you get to your feet, the three of you watch some kid from Texas blow his brains out between two palm trees.

It looks tempting.

-

_Steve,_

_You have never seen anything quite like the bloodbath in The Pacific Theater, and I pray you never do._

_Sure, it’s beautiful at first, but soon enough, the sand gets into your underwear and the sun leaves you blind. The heat leaves my clothes sticking to my skin like they are a part of me, and sometimes when my watch is over, I’m afraid to take them off because I think I might see red pulsing muscle and bone underneath them. Just thinking about it makes me dizzy and sick. I have had plenty of dreams like this. I have a lot of bad dreams lately, and I don’t know how to shake them.._

_I hear screams and bombs whistling in my ears while I try to sleep and dream of my limbs falling off because I am so wet and soggy with rain it feels like I might just crumble with the weight of it. I dream about the dead too, the bodies of GIs blown to bits, but that is something I see every day, so I don’t mind those as much._

_It’s the stuff my brain makes up that drives me insane. It gets so dark out here it feels like you’re choking on it. Like it’s pulling on your lungs and dragging you into your grave. That’s happened in a few dreams of mine too, I think. Things like this have left me waking with tears in my eyes and my throat swelled up. You remember being a kid and waking up sick as a dog? You remember feeling so bad and just wanting to curl up and die because of it? That’s the way it is out here, but that feeling never goes away._

_Don’t try to enlist again. Please. If you’re not doing it for your own sake, do it for mine. I’ll go insane if you’re out here, too. I’ll put my Colt in my mouth before I see you go through what the guys are going through here, and you’d go through it. Don’t say you won’t. None of us are who we used to be._

_Try to write back soon. I feel like I’m losing my head out here. All I got is you and Rebecca and Ma, but they can’t know this. You’re the only one allowed to know what’s knocking around in my head. You’re the only goddamn person allowed to know._

_Missing you. Your friend,_

_Bucky_

You can’t send that. Your stomach turns watery just thinking of putting it into an envelope.

~~_Steve,_ ~~

~~_Stevie_ ~~

Fuck it.

You toss the letters in the fire. You’ll try again tomorrow, once the rest of the sickness has sloughed off of you. The last thing Steve needs to know is more of what you’re seeing. Know about the gore on your mind. Honesty might be helpful for your own head, but it won’t do anyone else any good. You tell Steve you’re out here losing your marbles, and the little punk will swim to goddamn Guadalcanal himself.

Your sleep is restless and almost feverish in the heat. More cloying than usual. Jesus, you think you’re forgetting how to close your eyes. You should smoke, but a cigarette will make you feel worse, you know it. Your water won’t help. It sits like oil in your stomach as it is.

-

You don’t write Steve back for almost five days. And even after that long, lying through your teeth barely helps. You can’t keep it all sunshine and smiles, of course. Steve’s a lot of things, but stupid ain’t one of them. You’re just keeping him in the dark for his own sake. That’s all. Let him see what the world wants him to see. Let him see only what the pictures and the newspapers are showing the rest of Brooklyn.  
  
It’s barely dawn, and you’re choking down breakfast, sat on a log, ass sore on it. Your bitten legs are itching like crazy, but you pay them no mind as you eat your rations. The sky is painted in reds and blues and oranges, streaked with clouds so bright they could be stripes of sunlight. Or debris. Bloody body parts and chunks of guts littering the beach and turning the sand _red, red, red_ —

You swallow down the panic scratching at the inside of your chest, and shut your eyes tight. Count to three and breathe out, trying to steel yourself as best as you can.

If you think hard enough, you can pretend the heat beating down on you is dry and a little on the chilly side. That the water from your canteen is a beer with a few bubbles left, and that the sweat on your skin actually feels good. Like you’re thawing after a freezing winter, like it’s the first warm day you’ve felt in forever.

But truth be told, you’re sick of the heat. What you wouldn’t give to be shivering, so cold your bones hurt and your nose leaks. So cold you’d have to wear two pairs of socks and curl around Steve, but still shiver despite it all. 

When a breeze, wet and cool, rushes over you, it’s easy to pretend it’s true. You can pretend your sawdust-tasting food is a sandwich made up of leftover roast beef and a thick smear of mustard. You can pretend you smell exhaust and the yeast of baking bread from Mr. Cohen’s bakery.

When you finish your watch and your moping (because that’s exactly what it is), you move back to your tent and force yourself to write again. The island is still mostly asleep, the Japanese evidently included. Luger’s got watch now, anyway. You should try to rest and take your mind off of things for a while. 

_Steve,_

  
_Happy belated birthday. I wish I had time to get this out sooner, and I hope you had a good time. We are all fine out here, just tired, sore, and hungry, which isn’t as awful as it sounds. I really do miss hearing from you. It’s so hard to get letters and such out here, so I hope these at least are getting through to_ _you_ _. I’m real sorry if it takes me forever and a day to respond. I don’t mean anything by it. Cross my heart._

_Is the WPA still treating you well? Have you found any more work? Tell me all about it. Don’t feel the need to spare any details, since reading will help pass the time. I keep all of the letters you and the family send me. Know I have them on my person at all times. Last week, shrapnel was raining down on us like cats and dogs, but I was alright, because I knew I had a little bit of home with me._

_Sorry I’m being so mushy on you, pal, and for this being so short. It’s different out here. Not good different, either. It’s not what they’re showing at the picture show or in the papers. Keep that in mind and keep your behind in Brooklyn. When the war ends, I want to see you in one piece. I hope you liked the pictures I sent, by the way. I wish you could see how pretty the buildings were, how blue the water was, like something out of a painting._

_Sincerely, your pal,_

_Bucky_

It’s good enough. Hopefully it gets off the island and into his hands.

-

Everything ends up going according to plan in the end, ends up becoming a victory soaked in blood and sweat.

New troops come in to replace the sick and the weary. What’s left of your unit and the others are all on a boat bound for Australia the next morning. Queensland, more specifically, but you don’t bother looking around. You get to spend time in a hotel. You shave and shower and sleep in a bed for a whole night, and even though most of that is spent jolting awake, covered in sweat, you refuse to let it go to waste. 

You eat until you’re sick and drink yourself blind, and almost howl with relief when it turns out that you have to go back to the U.S., when it turns out to be Fort Hamilton, of all places in the country.

It won’t be for long, you know that. By the time you’re on a train, halfway across Kansas, the war in Europe has turned monstrous, leaving hundreds of thousands dead, and experienced soldiers are needed more than the rookies just starting out, so you’ll be heading to England by mid-September.

Once you get to Pennsylvania, it’s about six-thirty, and you ask your CO if you’re able to stop home once you get to New York. Somehow, by the fucking grace of a God you’re not sure you believe in anymore, he says yes. It’ll take almost a week to get things sorted, anyway, and they’ll send a telegram if they really need you, since all it will take is a trolley ride or the train to get you back to base.

You’re in Grand Central by eleven, and Brooklyn by midnight. Your legs feel shaky when you get out of your cab, and Christ, you could kiss the sidewalks right here and now, hug the lampposts for dear life. You wish some of your usual haunts were open, but everyone’s just starting to close up.

Your apartment is looming in front of you, and you take the stairs two at a time, not caring about the racket you make. You wish you’d gone to Vinegar Hill first, surprised Ma and Rebecca, but your address slipped out of your mouth before you could stop it.

Being here, walking up these stairs, it’s all muscle memory now. You swipe the key off the top of the door jamb, and slip it into the lock—this time with shaky fingers, brimming with anticipation. Christmas of ‘40 feels like a fever dream, like you were never here at all.

Weight lifts off your shoulders as you cross the threshold inside. You shut the door as quiet as you can, dropping the key on the coffee table. The apartment is dark and surprisingly cool. You take off your shoes, your jacket, your hat, and drop your bag by the sofa. You need a bath. You need a change of clothes. You need to sleep for the rest of the year. You need to melt into a puddle in the thick of a Brooklyn summer, boil until you’re nothing but steam.

When you reach the bedroom, Steve is asleep, shoulders rising and falling slowly, and you itch to touch him. To feel the invisible scratch of stubble on his face or to smooth his bangs off his forehead. Even in the dark, he looks different. Older, more serious. You suppose you’re not the same either. The kid who left for Fort McCoy two years ago is long gone, and you doubt he’ll come back.

It’s better to leave Steve be for now. You’re so tired and strung out, you might end up losing it, blubbering all over him, and he doesn’t need that. You clench your fists and move away, stripping to your skivvies. You fold your uniform and leave it on the bare mattress, not wanting to grab sheets and make your bed right now. You simply take your pillow, a quilt from the closet, and make camp on the sofa.

You’re out like a light the moment you shut your eyes, comforted by the familiarity, by the sounds and smells of home.

-

Some time later, you think you feel a hand—warm and heavy and steadying—on your cheek, smoothing over your hair, but it must be a dream, because you can still feel the breeze coming off the ocean, and the rock of a ship beneath your back.

-

You wake up at six forty-five, squint against the sunlight streaming in through the windows and catch the rock that sinks in your gut, the one that says, _haul your ass up or Powell is kicking you to the curb._

If only things were that simple now. You wish being late to work was still the end of the world.

-

You do the only thing you can think to do, and make breakfast. 

You find eggs in the fridge and crack them into a pan, put the percolator on the stove, and use the stale loaf of bread to make toast. By seven, the sun is higher and hotter, casting a golden glow around everything and warming you to the bone in a way the sun in Nouméa, Queensland, and San Francisco never could.

Slow, heavy footsteps fill your ears, and you have half a mind to wrap your fingers around your butter knife, to throw it into the throat of the Japanese soldier trying to sneak up on you before you realize you _know_ those footsteps. Know them better than your own.

“You stay out in the sun any longer, I think your skin’ll turn to leather, Buck,” Steve says, and you haven’t heard his voice in so long, it almost doesn’t sound like you remember, but it’s exactly like you remember it in the mornings—hoarse and low in his throat.

You turn off the burners, since everything is done, and turn around, spread your arms wide open. Steve looks more like himself in the light, hair turned gold in the sun, eyes bright and blue. He’s lost the last bit of youth in his face, and his cheekbones are sharper. Your face is sharper, too. You feel as skinny as he does.

“So, you’re sayin’ I don’t look handsome?” you ask.

Even though Steve rolls his eyes, you can see the crinkles at the corner of them, the sweet pull to his mouth. “Not when you just rolled off the sofa you don’t,” he shoots back, and it isn’t that funny but you laugh anyway. He jerks his head a little. “Get over here.”  
  
In the end, you’re not sure whose grip is tighter, but it’s a relief when you feel Steve squeeze the life out of you, when you can feel the warmth of his shoulder against your lips and breathe him in—sleep and warmth. “I only got a few days,” you say, choked, but you hope Steve brushes it off as you being squished. “Had to report to Fort Hamilton for duty, see where we’re headed next.”  
  
Steve loosens up, lets you go. “Just like that?” he says, face all screwed up. “Christ, you’d think they’d give you some time to get your head together.”  
  
“Not when Hitler’s breathing down our necks,” you say. You squeeze his arm as you pull away, despite how much you want to stay close. You could probably get away with more now, but that wouldn’t be fair. Wouldn’t be right. “Word is we’re headed for England next, but you didn’t hear that from me.”

“Yeah, yeah, my lips are sealed,” Steve says. “So, are we gonna sit around here all day starin’ at each other or are you gonna catch me up on where you’ve been?”  
  
-

You don’t tell Steve everything, but you both talk until your throats are sore. You tell him about Queensland and Nouméa, about Bernadette, about the gruesome beauty of the Solomon Islands. 

He tells you everything he left out of his letters. Tells you about his new position—which is now in Greenwich full-time, and how he doesn’t mind hanging around Manhattan so much, even though it isn’t home. You ask if he’d ever consider moving there and he says he’d rather be dead in Brooklyn than alive in any overpriced Manhattan apartment.

Soon enough, he has to catch the train, and so you clean yourself up, put on your old civilian clothes, which are actually a little big since you’ve dropped some weight, before you walk there with him. The last thing you want to do is sit in the apartment, twiddling your thumbs now that you’re out, breathing in the air of home and letting your shoulders slouch down a little. You stop at the automat for an early lunch, walk around and take everything in.

By three, you end up outside your family’s apartment, able to see a rush of dark hair through the window that must be Rebecca. You run up the stairs, a swell of excitement and emotion in your throat.

“Who’s there?” Becca calls after you knock, and you can hear her footsteps, fast and storming, coming closer.

“I’ll give you one guess!” you shout. You hear her curse, and the door swings open.

The scream she lets out tears at your eardrums, but you don’t even mind it. She leaps on you, arms around your neck, and you lift her right off the ground. “You asshole!” she laughs when you give her a spin. “You couldn’t let us know you were coming?”

“I know, I’m sorry,” you say, and _now_ it’s setting in. Now, you’re getting mushy. You lean back at the same time Rebecca does, set her back down. She’s wearing one of Ma’s old dresses, lips painted dark, hair done up in victory rolls. “But look at _you_ , you’re a movie star, Beck.”

She beams at that. “You’re not so bad yourself, Sergeant Barnes,” she says, and drags you inside. “Christ, Ma’s at the grocer’s. She’s gonna have a fit when she sees you.”

-

Rebecca’s ring is gorgeous, an heirloom from Scott’s grandmother. You let her do all the talking for a while, since you missed hearing from her. Her letters slowed down due to nursing school. The current plan is to get married at St. Josephs. Ma’s letting her wear her old wedding dress, and it’s been altered a little, since Becca’s become like a stick recently.

“So, when’s the big day?” you ask, and she makes a face that makes her look about six years old. LIke curly-haired little Becca, who used to chase you wherever you went.

“Well,” she starts. “We were plannin’ on next week actually, _but_ —”

“Becks,” you say warningly, pointing a finger at her. “Don’t rush it on my account, I can’t just—”  
  
“Scott and I have waited long enough,” she argues. “What’s a few days, anyway? You’re telling me he won’t wanna marry me now? The kid’s crazy about me.”

  
Scott definitely is, but God, they’re not kids anymore. They’re twenty-one a piece, and getting _married._ “I.” You chuckle, feeling a little crazy. A little light-headed. “Sorry. I just didn’t think I’d get to see you at your wedding, that’s all.”  
  
Becca slings her arm around your shoulders. “Well, someone’s gotta walk me down the aisle, right?” she says, as though that settles it. “And to think, I was gonna ask Steve to do it.”

-  
  
When Ma gets back, Becca makes you wait in the kitchen, and whispers something along the lines of, _don’t blow your top but Bucky’s been here for about half an hour_.

You hear bags being set on the table, and you come out with your hands raised up.

“I know,” you say. “I didn’t call, I didn’t write, I’m a _terrible_ son, khul kiro chav, the worst to ever grace God’s green earth—”  
  
“Oh, shut _up_ , Jamie,” Ma says, and tugs you in with as much strength as the guys in your unit. You hang on tight and say, “Hey, Ma,” like you might not get to say it again.

It seems that every single time you come home, it feels less and less likely you’ll get another chance to come back.

-

You try not to think about that for the rest of the day, trailing into the afternoon and the early evening. You do a lot of the talking this time around, but you leave out all the grit, all the ugliness you left in the conversation with Steve. This is about as squeaky clean as you can get. You’re relieved you’re wearing clothes that cover you up, since it leaves the scars from bullets and knives, from mosquito bites you scratched and scratched at, completely invisible.

By eight-thirty, Becca is off to the Proctors’, presumably to tell Scott about the possible change of plans, and you hang around for another hour with Ma, both of you pretending that it’s just a normal night.

“You’ve been okay out there?” she asks as she walks you out, stopping you with a hand on your arm. “Don’t lie for my sake, just tell it like it is.”

“As okay as I can be,” you say, which isn’t a lie. “It ain’t a walk in the park, but I’m getting by. I’ll see you tomorrow?”  
  
“Tomorrow it is,” Ma says, and then yells as you head down the block. “Try on your father’s suit, make sure it still fits! If not, wear your uniform! If Rebecca’s getting married on Saturday, you’re not allowed to show up in rags!”

-

As it turns out, Rebecca _is_ getting married on Saturday. 

She and Scott didn’t have much money invested in a venue, since they’re saving up for a place of their own in Cobble Hill. And since the Proctors are much more active members in the church compared to the Barneses—with two children in the choir and another planning to enter the priesthood, Scott’s mother volunteering at almost every church event—it’s easy to reschedule the ceremony.

The church is just as you remember it. The Proctor side is full, with the Newark Proctors and the Astoria Proctors and the Crown Heights ones, too. Christ, you’ve never seen so much red hair in your life.

The Barnes side is made up of Rebecca’s friends, of Ma, Steve, some neighbors who asked if they could come by. Even though it’s a load of friendly faces, it’s nothing compared to Scott’s side.

You opt for your uniform, since Pop’s suit is just a hair too big on you now. You wait at the entrance for Becca, who you hear bickering with two of her friends as they put finishing touches on her veil.

“Hold _still_.”  
  
“It looks _fine_ , Beth!”

And holy cow, is Rebecca right. Her dress fits her perfectly, and she’s wearing a pair of earrings she’s had forever. Her veil is simple, obviously from these past three years, even though the wedding dress is older than both of you.

She slips beside you as her bridesmaids and the groomsmen head in, links her arm with yours. “How do I look?” she asks, just low enough for you to hear.

“Like a movie star,” you say. “Don’t even think about going to Hollywood, they’ll snatch you right up.”  
  
You can see her grin beneath the veil, and you meet her eyes, respond with one of your own. “Christ, okay,” she mutters, puffs out a shaky breath as the organ starts up. “Then let’s get this show on the road.”

-

The ceremony is beautiful, and by noon, Scott Proctor and Rebecca Barnes-Proctor are running out of the church with rice thrown all over them. They’re grinning ear to ear, more than pleased with themselves. Someone slaps you on the shoulder in the midst of it all, saying, “It’s your turn now, Buck!” and it’s a hectic enough moment that you’re able to brush it off.

There’s a crush of people headed for Scott’s family home in Brownsville, and it’s consistently loud and busy as it is, but this is on another level. 

A bunch of men are gathered in one room, and all the ladies in another. Someone takes a picture of Scott on an armchair, Rebecca sat on the ledge with her arms around his shoulders, their hands interlocked, rings front and center. Lots of pictures are taken that night, and you have a feeling you won’t get to see any of them.

It’s almost midnight when the party begins to break up, when Rebecca changes into the extra dress Ma packed for her, the wedding dress stowed away, to be taken home until Scott and Becca settle into their new place. It’s one in the morning when you, Ma, and Steve leave Becca alone with her husband, somehow finding a way onto the trolley.

“They’ll be talking till sunrise,” Ma says as you settle into your seats. Your face hurts from grinning, voice hoarse from laughing. You didn’t imagine feeling this good ever again, but maybe that’s just you falling into one of your holes again. You fall into a lot of holes, lately. “Better leave ‘em be.”  
  
“You can say that again.” You lean back a little, your knee bumping against Steve’s of its own accord. “I think I’ve had my fill of Proctors for a while. Next time I deal with that is the day Becca has a baby.”  
  
Ma groans at that. “Oi, please,” she says, pinches her nose between her thumb and forefinger. “That’ll be any minute. I’m not old enough to be a grandmother. No way, no how. Do I look old to either of you? Actually, don’t answer that.”  
  
She’s grinning despite it all. Now that you think about it, she’s barely forty-two. You always forget how small the age difference between the two of you is.

“You enjoy that, Steve?” she continues, and shoves his knee. “I saw you having some kind of love affair with the wall.”  
  
“Didn’t I say something like that earlier?!” You shove him harder than she does. “Swear to God, I did!”  
  
Steve elbows you in the ribs, smile still plastered on his face. “I gotta agree with Bucky on this one,” he says. “I’ve had enough of that family for a while. I’m over the moon for Becca and Scott, but the rest of them?”  
  
“Can go fuck themselves,” Ma finishes for him, just low enough for the two of you to hear.

It’s a nice ride home. You and Steve wave her off as she gets off across from home. By two, you’re home, feeling light on your feet as you flop on the sofa. “Y’know, they’re not the best crowd, but I think Becks found herself a decent guy,” you say. You smooth your sweaty hair off your brow, toss your cap on the coffee table.

Steve looks at you like you’ve grown two heads. “It took you _this_ _long_ to say so?” he says, loosening his tie, shaking his head. “You’re...God, you’re crazy.”  
  
“Me?” You throw your arms in the air. “You didn’t like him either!”

“Yeah, and then your sister made me hang out with him,” Steve says. Points at you. “And for the record, I was on the fence as much as you were, but they’re good together. Scott needs Becca to give him a push, and Becca needs Scott to talk her down sometimes. I dunno, I think anyone similar to her would have, I dunno, tried to soften her up or something. Change her. I doubt Scott’s gonna do that.”  
  
“Thinker and a talker,” you say. It’s ridiculous, but you wonder, if everything was different, if you were a girl or Steve was, if people would have said the same about the two of you. “Opposites attract, I guess.”  
  
“Well, we’re still friends, aren’t we?” Steve shrugs.

“You sayin’ I talk too much?” you ask.

“Nah,” Steve says, and sits down next to you. His knee bumps against yours, but it’s not an accident. It doesn’t feel like an unconscious movement. “I’m sayin’ you think too much, Buck.”

“Yeah, maybe,” you mutter, and the air in the room feels both too heavy and too fragile, so you try your best to clear it. “But hey, that means I’m the one with a brain, Stevie.”  
  
Steve snorts. “I hate you,” he says. “I knew that was gonna back fire on me.”  
  
“I’m shocked you had enough brain to know it,” you say, and he thumps you in the back of the head. “Hey! Ain’t it illegal to assault a man in uniform?”  
  
Steve waves a hand at you. “I’ve been arrested before.”  
  
“For four hours!”

“What’s another stint in the slammer?” he asks,  
  
“For Chris _sakes,_ ” you snap, trying not to grin when he messes your hair up, pulls it from its style despite you shoving him away. “I change my mind. I can’t fucking wait to go to England. I didn’t miss you at all.”

-

After a quick report to Fort Hamilton, you get word that you’re getting on a ship bound for London come Wednesday morning, which gives you three more days of R&R. You force yourself to go to mass, have dinner at home. It’s just you, Ma, Becca, and Scott, since Steve’s been in Manhattan all day. Or so he says. For some reason, you don’t believe him.

It’s a nice time, but the reality of leaving is slowly setting in, like an ice cube slipping down the back of your neck. A steady, constant chill that puts a damper over everything. It’s hard to think that the world, that Brooklyn, keeps on moving whether you’re here or not.

-

The next day, you grab a box of chocolate rugelach from Mr. Cohen—whose youngest son is now sixteen and looking more like a man than a boy, even taller than you remember. You end up talking to the old man for much longer than you initially plan to, but you don’t mind it so much. You missed this place more than you realize. You ask after Pete, despite the clench of dread in your gut. You really never know these days.

Pete enlisted at the beginning of the year, and at the moment, he’s somewhere in North Africa, but he’s all right, considering he’s been writing home whenever he can. You’re relieved. Relieved he’s all right, hoping he didn’t end up anywhere near the Solomon Islands or Europe.

When you get home, Steve is already there, looking far too pissed off to have simply been working.

“What did you do this time?” you ask around a mouthful.

Steve looks at you incredulously. “I didn’t do anything,” he says.

“Oh, you motherfucker,” you say, shove another rugelach in your mouth and drop the box on the counter. They’re really fucking good today, and you can tell they’re fresh, even through your anger. You point at Steve, mouth full. “Y’tried to fuckin’ enlist again, didn’t you? Where’d you say you’re from this time?”  
  
“Bucky —”  
  
“ _Answer_ me, Rogers!”  
  
“Swallow your food and maybe I will!” Steve says. “Christ, you’re gonna choke like that one day.”  
  
“What are you, my mother?” you argue, but swallow anyway, wipe the crumbs off your face. “Are you ever gonna give this a rest?”  
  
“Probably not,” Steve says simply.

“What’s it gonna take to make you stop tryin’, then?” you ask. “Getting on the front lines?”  
  
“Just let it go, alright?” Steve says. “They might not let me in at all, but what am I if I don’t keep trying?”  
  
“A smart man,” you say without missing a beat. “A very, very smart man. A genius, as a matter of fact.”

Nothing from either of you, not for a few seconds. It’s obvious neither of you want to fight, but this just tends to happen when the high of you coming home fades and you two get back to normal. It doesn’t mean anything. It never ends up sticking, anyway.

“You know what? Forget it,” you say, shove your box toward him. “Eat one of these and move on.”

Steve gives you a look. “I don’t see how it’s gonna help,” he says, takes one anyway. “You’re still leaving. I’m still gonna be here not knowing if you’re—”  
  
He shuts his mouth quickly at that, shoves the rugelach in instead of continuing. Evidently, that didn’t come out the way he wanted. Your chest gives a painful twinge. 

“Hey, forget about that for now, huh?” you say. “You got something to do tonight?”

Steve is visibly racking his brain, and then his eyes widen. “Goddamn it, I—” he says, and he’s already speeding toward the bedroom. “I’m supposed to go to the gallery at eight. _Christ_.”

“Greenwich?” you call, continuing eating. “Mind if I tag along?”  
  
Steve reappears in the doorway. “It’ll make my night less boring,” he says, and holds up a hand. “Maybe don’t wear your uniform. Or mention the war at all. They’re not a crowd who favors the army.”

“You got it,” you say, and wipe your mouth on your hand, lick your lips beforeyou salute him. “Bucky Barnes, definitely not a Sergeant in the U.S. Army.”  
  
-

It’s about the same as the last time you came to Greenwich with Steve, though it’s not as off-putting to you, Sure, it’s too many people, but they’re not a gaggle of noise. Steve has some new pieces, joining his old ones, which have been shelved and brought out again in a cycle. 

You can’t imagine how frustrating it must be for him, putting this much time into something only to have it given almost no attention aside from some mild interest.

“We should do something tomorrow, too,” you say as you head for the train. “I’ve just got lunch with the family and then I’m all yours.”

  
“You don’t gotta do that,” Steve says. “It’s your family, Bucky, who knows when you’re gonna get to see them again?”  
  
You stop in your tracks, pinning him in place with your gaze, brows knitting together. Something angry and hurt is rising up your gut, but it’s not necessarily for yourself.

“You’re my family, too, pal,” you say, too soft for your liking. You mean it either way, but now there’s weight to it. “Don’t tell me you don’t know that.”

Steve’s jaw works, something obviously on his mind. Moments like this, you can practically see the cogs in his head turning. You think about the way he rushed after you in the train station after Christmas, how he ended up keeping whatever he really wanted to say to himself.

“Steve,” you try again. “I mean it.”  
  
“‘Course I know you mean it, Buck,” he says, shakes off whatever’s trying to eat at him. “‘Course I do.”  
  
“Then there’s nothing to worry about,” you say. “Now, get the lead outta your feet or else we’ll be stuck down here for another hour.

On the train, things lighten up again. Neither of you mention your exchange on the street, the funny strain running between the two of you. At home, some of it dissipates, but not by much, and when the time to sleep finally comes, you can’t seem to shut your eyes.

You watch the rise and fall of Steve’s back for what feels like hours, watch the way moonlight turns his skin silver, and luckily, by the time you think about doing something stupid, you fall asleep.

-

Another trolley ride to Fort Hamilton, and then from Fort Hamilton to Vinegar Hill. 

You’re reading the paper when you feel a pair of eyes on you, and when you find two girls blatantly staring you down, you just launch into talking for a while. Turns out they’re headed to Vinegar Hill, too, grew up there themselves. You say you think you’d remember pretty faces like theirs, and the brunette—Connie—turns tomato red. They think it’s swell that you’re visiting your family, and hey, since it’s your last night before you ship out, you deserve to have some fun.  
  
When you mention you have a friend, the blonde—Bonnie—perks up. You don’t tell ‘em much, just the stuff they need to know. You wanted to hang around Steve tonight anyway, and maybe this will give you both an opportunity for a little excitement.

Besides, the Stark Expo looks pretty neat.

-

Later, when you’re headed past the movie house, it feels like divine intervention when you find Steve, getting the shit kicked out of him by some big, beefy asshole who doesn’t know when to let up. Or maybe it’s Steve who doesn’t know when to let up.

Somehow, you convince him, beg him, to come out with you, no matter how much he insists that any dame who met him today wouldn’t like him one bit, since apparently, he’s _that_ sour about getting _another_ 4F. 

Christ, you’d think he’d stop being surprised at this point.

-

You and Connie have a grand old time. She tells you about her job with the WAC, working as a switchboard operator, about how she spent most of her childhood in Brooklyn before ending up at some fancy boarding school upstate. You walk around the expo until the man of the hour, Howard Stark, shows up on a stage with his prototype for a flying car and even though it malfunctions, it’s still one hell of a sight. Makes you feel like you’re in an issue of _Amazing Stories_.

You never hear the rest of his speech, though, because when you look behind you, Steve is nowhere to be found.

-

You two do end up bickering again, but not for long. You’re only heading to the dance hall, but on the off chance you end up missing each other later, you tug him in for a hug, quick and firm.

Bonnie ends up going home, and you feel a bit bad for her, since you may or may not have put it in her head that Steve was a GI, and that’s your fault, really. Not either of theirs. Still, you and Connie continue your good night, but she’s an early bird, and you end up walking her home at eight-thirty.

“Night doesn’t have to end here, you know,” you say lightly. “I could always come in for a cup of coffee.”

Connie smiles at that, lingering in the doorway. “Tell you what,” she says. “You win the war, and then you can come home and look me up. Maybe I’ll say yes.”  
  
It was worth a try. You give Connie a nod. “Will do. You have a nice night,” you say, and make your way back to the corner to catch the trolley.

-

“Look, I’m sorry it didn’t go as planned,” you all but groan when you shut the door “So, if you wanna go do something else—”  
  
“Buck, don’t worry about it,” Steve says from the sofa, and there’s something off about his expression. Pinched and sour. It’s all in his face, but there’s an ease to his body. You’re not sure you want to know what happened. “I mean it.”  
  
“Just wasn’t fair on you, I guess,” you say, shrugging off your jacket, your cap. You untuck your shirt, loosen your tie, before you plop down next to him. “But hey, plenty’a fish in the sea and all that.”

Steve doesn’t say much in response to that. Just hums, like he always does when you know he definitely isn’t listening. When his head’s far away. “What time are you leaving tomorrow?” he asks.

You suck your teeth for a second. “Boat leaves from Manhattan at five,” you say, already feeling the hours slipping away. “Probably gotta be outta here by...God, three-thirty at the latest. Think I might just stay up, leave around three and get some shut-eye on the boat.”

“I’ll stay up with you,” Steve offers. “We can play cards or something.”  
  
You snort. “I’d like to see you try to play against me now,” you say. With the way you’re slouched, you have to look up at him. “I’ve only gotten better.”

“How do you know I haven’t?” Steve quips, and pushes off the sofa. “Get off your ass and see if you can beat me.”  
  
You’re starting to tip into a hole. Deep, dark, cavernous. You’ve been on the brink of it since your train pulled into Grand Central, but you’re not going to let yourself fall in. Not here. Not right now.

Steve is holding a hand out for you, anyway, and you’d be a fool not to take it.

-

It’s Rummy, then poker, then blackjack, and even though you stay on top, Steve gets on a few winning streaks. “Jesus, Rogers, you a card shark now?” you ask, itching for a cigarette. For something strong and stiff to drink.

“I told you, I got better,” Steve says with a shrug. “Mr. O’Leary’s a pretty good player, anyway. Used to hustle cards, apparently. Bet on horse races in Atlantic City.”  
  
“So, that’s what you’re doing now?” you say. “Going to Atlantic City with the O’Learys? I ain’t judging, I just didn’t see you as that kinda guy.”  
  
“Everyone’s going somewhere new, anyway. That’s what I heard.” Steve shuffles the cards easily, like you taught him so many years ago. “Scattered like rats from a ship since Odie’s got shut down.”  
  
You slam your hands down on the table. “Odie’s got _what_?”

-

With the radio on, the constant back and forth between the two of you, it feels just like old times, times where you would just end up in bed at the end of this, and wake up knowing the only thing you were set on doing was heading to the bakery, and maybe trying to find a steadier job. 

It’s like you blink, and it’s almost one in the morning. Your bag has been packed for hours. The thought of walking out the front door is becoming even more difficult by the second.

You and Steve have abandoned the table for the bedroom, sat on the floor with your backs against Steve’s bed. You don’t know when you asked him to draw you something, but you know it spilled out of your mouth at some point, and now here you are, looking over his shoulder, watching a sketch come to life on the page.

“It ain’t much,” Steve says. “But you did ask.”

“Looks good to me,” you say, more tired than you’d like to admit. “Who is she?”  
  
“One of the models at the WPA. Her name’s Jeanie,” Steve says without looking up, putting the finishing touch on the sharp cut of her cheekbone.  
  
“She looks like a sight for sore eyes,” you say. You lean back, shove your hair off your brow, and take a slow, steadying breath. “I gotta talk to you about something.”

In what seems like an instant, Steve stops in his tracks. Closes the book and sets it on the table separating your beds. “You okay?” he asks, and _Christ,_ what a question. You’d laugh but you don’t want to seem cruel.

“I dunno,” you say, itchy all over. “I just—I dunno, pal. I feel like I can’t just spit it out.”  
  
You didn’t plan on this. You didn’t plan on saying _anything_ to him, but you feel like a pot boiling over, like a bomb about to go off. Something wild and desperate wormed its way into you while you were trapped in that foxhole in Guadalcanal, something that keeps telling you _you’re not coming back this time_.

“Buck, whatever it is, you can tell me,” Steve says, so damn earnest. His eyes are burning into yours, skinning you to the bone. “It’s just us, anyway. I’m not gonna think of you any differently, whatever it is.”  
  
It’s like he has an inkling already. A part of you hope he does. Maybe it’ll be less of a shock when the truth comes barrelling out of your mouth. “Tell me you mean that,” you say, and your voice cracks with it. “Tell me that’s true.”

Steve’s brows knit together. “I mean it,” he says. “‘Course I mean it.”  
  
Your hands are steady when they’re around a rifle, when they’re curled around knives and grenades, or crushing the windpipe of an enemy, but now they’re shaking so hard you have to clench your fists together. Your chest is as tight as Steve’s must get when he’s sick, like you can’t breathe in properly. 

You nod once, scooting closer, throat dry. “Then I’m real sorry about this,” you croak.

It’s like your heart is stopping completely when you slide your hand to the back of Steve’s neck, when you fit your mouth over his. 

His lips are warm and wet from licking and biting at them—a tic you’ve always noticed when he was concentrating—and this close, he smells like your old bottle of aftershave. You forgot it when you left for Fort McCoy, and switched to a new brand, but Steve must have stuck with yours. The thought of that sends a chill up your spine.

With the fog in your head, you aren’t even sure if he kisses you back.

You pull away with a soft sound of your mouths, hand still lingering on him, thumb smoothing over the divot at the base of his skull, the short hairs there, blood pounding in your ears.  
  
It’s not the first time this has happened, but it might as well be. 

There are obvious spots of color on Steve’s cheeks, appearing dark in the dim light of the room, and you wonder if your face looks the same way, considering the way it’s burning up. You’re beginning to sweat under your collar.

You’re both breathless, staring at each other like the other’s gone crazy, and for the first time in your life, you have no idea what’s going on in Steve’s head. “Say something,” you manage to say. You know how needy it sounds, but you can’t bring yourself to care. “Please say something, pal. I’m gonna go out of my head if you don’t.”  
  
Steve’s throat works, bobs hard under pale skin. He hasn’t shrugged you off yet. Hasn’t shoved you or hit you or called you anything nasty. “Bucky,” he starts, strangled. You can feel the heat of his breath against your mouth. “I thought you were...I didn’t know you...”  
  
Your smile doesn’t reach your eyes. “That was the point,” you say quietly. “I didn’t want you to know. But if you want me to buzz off now, I will.”

“What? That’s the last thing I want you to do,” Steve says firmly, and moves to face you directly as your hand slips to his shoulder, not wanting to let go. Not just yet. “I don’t want you to disappear on me now, I don’t want you to just run off into Europe after this. How could you think I’d let you do that? You’re smarter than that, Buck. Come on.”  
  
“Not when it comes to this,” you say, swallow thickly as you shake your head. You look down at his mouth again, resist the urge to swipe your thumb over his lower lip. “Not when it comes to you.”  
  
That cracks his expression wide open. Your fingers tighten at his shoulder, worry at his shirt. “I know I got bad timing, I know I’m putting you on the spot, and that ain’t fair,” you continue. “But if I don’t come back—”  
  
“You’re gonna come back,” Steve insists.

“Yeah, well, what if I don’t?” you argue, breath picking up again. “Steve, I can’t keep lying to myself about this, and I sure as hell can’t keep lying to you. It’s not fair to either of us, and I feel like I’m gonna be—God, I feel like it’s gonna—”  
  
You must look shocky, or on the edge of breaking down completely, because Steve says, “Bucky, for Chrissakes, _look_ at me,” and it’s like all your thoughts stop in their tracks.

His voice is steadying, and when his hands, slender and huge, come to either side of your face to make you look at him, you can’t help leaning into it, curling your fingers around his wrist, thumb sliding over the sharp jut of it. “That’s enough. I know you like wallowing once in a while, but—” the laugh that comes from him is breathy, and might not be a laugh at all. “Did you ever even think that maybe I want you, too?”  
  
It feels like he’s punched you in the stomach, knocked the breath straight out of your lungs.

You lift your head. “What?” you ask lamely, voice a rasp in your throat.

Now, it’s Steve’s turn to look like he’s standing in front of a firing squad. His smile is barely there, but there’s tension to it, like after all this time, you might just change your mind and decide you don’t care anymore. “You want me to spell it out for you?” he asks. “I’ve...Buck, I’ve been wanting you for as long as I can remember.”

The laugh that spills from your mouth is a little hysterical. No, it _is_ hysterical. All this time, you’ve been driving yourself crazy, letting what you feel for him turn into something ugly and foreboding, and you could have _had him_. You could have had him whenever you wanted. It’s the fucking definition of unfair.

“So,” you start, once you get some of your brain to cooperate with you again, your mad smile slipping away. “So, hold on a second. You mean, all this time I’ve been trying to shove it down and you’ve—”  
  
“Been doing the exact same thing,” Steve finishes, easing his hands away from your face with obvious hesitation.

You drop your head back against the bed. “So, that night when I taught you to dance,” you say.

“Yep,” Steve says, and then more tense, “You didn’t forget what happened on New Years, either, did you?”  
  
“New Years ‘37,” you groan, scrub your hands over your face before give him a look. “Worst night of my life.”

Steve laughs bitterly. “You can say that again,” he says.

There’s a beat of silence that almost seems impenetrable, but then you nudge him, and his expression softens in measures. “Hey, I don’t wanna dwell on that. Not now,” you say, as gently as you’re able, and lean closer. “I’ve got, what? A couple hours till I leave? Let’s just...I dunno, let’s try to make the most of it, I guess.”  
  
Steve’s eyes lock onto yours, and your stomach gives a flip when he shifts to his knees, hovering over you, hand slipping to the back of your neck. “I really wish you would’ve said something sooner,” he says. “But I think I can make do with that.”

“Yeah,” you murmur. You’re still not so sure if you should touch him, but if this is all you’ll ever get, you’ll take it. “Guess we don’t got much of a choice.”  
  
Steve makes a thoughtful noise. “Doesn’t look like it.”

When he closes the distance between the two of you, it’s like there’s finally space in your chest to breathe. Like strings are being cut loose from your limbs.

-

There’s no time for anything more than necking, and Christ, do you do a lot of that.

You end up on Steve’s bed after the floor begins to make your back ache. For a while, you’re lying on your sides, legs tangled together, bodies pressed close, but then Steve slips out of your arms, pushes you onto your back and straddles you with his hands splayed on your chest, your blood rushes to your dick so fast, you think you get a head rush.

“Okay,” you say hoarsely, slide your hands up his back. Your lips feel hot and swollen. “Okay, you’ve done this before.”  
  
“What the hell do you think happens in Greenwich, Buck?” Steve chuckles. You pull him down again, an arm around his shoulders, feeling yourself smile a little dopily. You feel drunk on him.

“What, you going to dirty parties down there, Rogers? Drinking bathtub gin?” you tease, and you kiss him a little harder this time, finding it easier and easier every time you do. There’s more heat in it now, though. A deeper sense of urgency. “Why didn’t you invite me, huh? I don’t lie about likin’ girls, you know.”

“Yeah, I know that much,” Steve says. “And I don’t go to dirty parties, alright? But get a bunch of artists, all the same age, in the same room and give ‘em a bottle of liquor, something’s gonna happen.”

“Sounds like a dirty party, if you ask me.”  
  
Steve is laughing when he says, “Bucky, I swear to God —”  
  
“Do fellas show up, too?” you ask, gobsmacked when Steve looks at you like you’re an idiot because they _do_. You snort out a laugh. “That’s—that really happens in Greenwich?”  
  
“Where there’s smoke there’s fire,” Steve says, and when he nips, licks at your jaw, you can’t hold back the curse that spills from your mouth. “And that place is a goddamn inferno.”

You’re aching now. Pressing against your trousers. That was fast. God, Steve’s got you by the throat. He always has, but it’s worse now. A hundred times worse. A thousand times worse. The rapid beat of your heart feels good now, keeps sending shocks of need through your veins.

“I wanna try something,” Steve breathes out, and you already feel your lips curling upward into something filthy. There’s a glint in Steve’s eye when he notices it. He meets you in the middle when you lean in again, licks into your mouth in a way that makes you feel hot all over, leaves the back of your neck prickling.  
  
You glance at the clock. One-thirty. More time than you thought you had. You let out a shaky breath. “Pal, you name it and I’ll probably say yes,” you say against his mouth, bite at the swell of his lower lip. “So spit it out.”  
  
“You’ve probably done it with a girl before, but fellas do it, too,” Steve says, kisses you again. You can already feel your gut winding tight, heat blooming up your throat. “You put it between their thighs.”  
  
You’ve done that before. You’ve done that plenty of times, only with girls, but you like it way more than you’d like to admit. “Uh-huh,” you say, voice a wreck, head swimming with want. You slide your hands underneath Steve’s shirt, feel smooth, hot skin beneath your palms. “You want me to do it to you, then?”  
  
A breath is punched out of him, fast and stuttering. Like it’s better when you put it into words. “Yeah.” Steve sounds as hungry for it as you are, eyes blown wide with it. “Yeah, Buck, God, I want you to.”

You nod quickly. You keep your clothes on any longer, you’ll ruin them. Better to get them off, keep ‘em clean until you have to clear out. “Tell me you’ve got slick, Steve,” you say.

He taps your hip before he moves off of you, disappearing into the other room for a moment. You take it as an opportunity to take your shoes and socks off, slip out of your trousers. You leave it all on your bed, as neat as you can manage. You’re unbuttoning your shirt with uncooperative fingers when you hear Steve mutter _got it_ , halfway through slipping it off when he returns with a tin of Vaseline, tosses it to you.

You can’t help laughing after you catch it, thrilled and light-headed with how much you want him. “Goddamn it,” you say when he shoves your shirt down your shoulders, tugging him closer. “I swear you’re gonna be the death of me.”  
  
-

When Steve gets his clothes off, you take a second to look at him. He makes a pretty picture, all sharp edges and skinny hips, and sure you’ve seen him in varying states of undress, but not like this. Not for _you_. Not for more than a half-second in which you immediately tore your eyes away. 

Now, you can drink him in for real. Let your eyes linger over the smatter of freckles on his shoulders, the dark pink of his nipples, the thatch of blond hair between his legs, his dick hard against his stomach. Your head is propped up against the pillows in his bed, and you’re so tight with anticipation, you think you won’t last long at all. Time feels like it’s speeding up, even though you know better than that.

“I take it back,” you say, and Steve knits his brows together. “ _You’re_ the sight for sore eyes.”

Steve groans when he gets closer, crawls up on the bed. “That ain’t gonna work on me,” he says. You spread your legs a little, let him turn to get situated, his back against your chest, his skin warm and a little sweaty. You wrap your arm around his waist, move your hips down to settle between his Vaseline-slick thighs. “I’m not fallin’ for it, Buck.”  
  
“You just might,” you murmur, drag your mouth over the corner of his jaw, the side of his face. “There’s a reason girls like me, y’know.”  
  
“Got a funny feeling it ain’t cause you have a way with words,” Steve says. He reaches around, hooks his forearm around the back of your neck. 

“You got me there,” you say. You watch the rise and fall of his chest, grin into his skin before you thrust your hips upward. You moan, cut into a curse, clutching him tighter. Between Steve’s thighs, it’s tight and warm, and as you slide up again, you can feel his balls brushing against your dick and isn’t _that_ something.“You got me there, Stevie.”

It’s different than it is with a girl. Girls are smoother and softer. You’re usually able to reach up, feel the swell of a breast in your hand, or reach between a pair of supple legs and make them feel even better, but doing this with another man feels rougher somehow. Better. Steve’s sharp and long and you can feel his moans deep in your chest, feel a swoop in your stomach when you watch the twitch of his dick, the steady leak of pre-come smearing near his navel.

“ _God,_ Buck,” he moans when you find a sweet spot that makes you shudder, dragging against the underside of his dick, making your stomach coil tight, “Keep up like that. That’s—fuck, that feels good.”

You must say something in agreement. You aren’t sure. You’re not thinking straight. All you can smell or see or hear or feel is Steve, and the thought of that is so overwhelming, you think you might go over the edge. You think you’ll hear the filth spilling from his mouth every time you get yourself off now. “Tighten up your legs,” you huff, and when he does, you whine against his shoulder, eyes squeezing shut. You thrust up harder. “There ya go. Stay tight like that for me.”  
  
The rhythm you find with him is easy. Ridiculously easy, and your bodies fit like they were made for this. You’re on the razor’s edge, soon enough, though, months of need, months of not touching anyone leaving you hurtling toward your climax before you can even try to stop it. You can’t help wondering when Steve last did this, and maybe you should ask him, but maybe it’s not the time.  
  
Besides, when he breathes out shakily, voice catching as he says, “Get your hand on me. Jerk me off, Buck,” any attempts at rational thought fly out the window.  
  
“Jesus Christ,” you mutter, delirious, and do just that. Steve’s dick is heavy and blood-hot in your hand when you start stroking him, timing it with the movement of your hips, despite how jerky they’ve become. “You’re a trip. You’re a goddamn trip, is what you are, Steve.”  
  
Even if Steve has something to say to that, it never comes out of his mouth. Just something like your name as you jerk him harder, squeeze your fingers around him, and then he’s coming over your fingers with a choked off moan, hips arching upward, thighs clenching harder around you and—yep, you’re gone, too, following him over the edge, stroking him through it, slamming your hips upward as your body seeps itself of the strength it has left, vision flashing white.

It seems to go on forever. You let go of Steve when he softens in your hand. wipe your fingers on his hip, shutting your eyes, catching your breath.

“You alright?” you ask, tongue thick in your mouth, still listening for a wheeze or a stutter in Steve’s breath. “Steve?”  
  
“Still here,” he says. You feel his chest rise and fall under your palm, feel his heart pound against it. “You goin’ in your head on me?”  
  
“Nah,” you mutter. You’re still in something like shock. “I don’t think I got much of a head left right now.”  
  
“So, same as usual?” Steve asks. Your laugh is wheezy, and you bury your face in his neck, breathe in sex and sweat. “Dick,” you mutter, exhale against his throat. “God, you’re such a dick. I love you so much.”  
  
“Yeah,” Steve breathes out, agreeing. “I love you, too, asshole.”

Oh.

Well, that didn’t go the way you imagined it would. 

You thought it would have barreled out of you earlier tonight, when you felt like you were on the verge of bursting out of your skin, and it would have been tainted with heartache, with the fear of not hearing it back, but _there it fucking is_ , as plain as day. Steve loves you, too.

And now you have to leave.

Now, you can’t fall asleep like this. You can’t wake up tomorrow morning and see his face, or feel his mouth back on yours. You won’t be able to touch him freely, to lean back on the sofa and let your head fall in his lap or do _anything_ because you waited too goddamn long. You don’t want to think it, because you couldn’t have known, but it’s true. You know it in your bones.

You force yourself to breathe, running your hand up and down his stomach, tacky with come. You open your eyes, look down at a big blond head, at the line of a bigger nose, the flush on a slim chest. “I don’t have’ta go,” you say before you can stop yourself. Brush your lips over the shell of his ear. “I could, I dunno, oversleep. Miss the boat. It wouldn’t be a lot of time, but, it’d be time.”  
  
You feel Steve shake his head before you see it. “Don’t want you gettin’ arrested,” he says. “Besides, they need you out there.”  
  
“What if you need me here?” you press without malice. It’s fruitless. A waste of time. Not convincing him, but convincing _yourself_ that you could do it. You can’t taint your family with the crime of desertion, can’t get Steve involved. You sigh, slow and deliberate. “I know I’m talkin’ crazy. You don’t need to tell me.”  
  
“If it makes you feel any better,” Steve says, and he’s turning in your arms, leaving you nose to nose with him. “I wouldn’t mind hiding you in here ‘til the war ends.”  
  
“You gonna cover for me when the brass comes knocking on the door, too?” you chuckle.  
  
“Mh-hm,” Steve hums. “Got my spiel all ready. ‘No Sergeant Barnes at this address, sir, you’d do well trying another neighborhood.’”

Now, kissing him is like breathing. The simplest thing in the world. Maybe this time around, you’re not as content, but you try to hold onto those last dregs of comfort, the feeling of safety you had just a moment ago.

“It’s two-thirty, Buck,” Steve says after the kiss breaks. “Don’t got a whole lotta time left.”

You shake your head, slide your hand up his cheek, trace your thumb just beneath his eye. “Just need another minute with you,” you murmur. “Just another minute, that’s all I ask for.”

-

After that, the clock seems to speed up, and time moves painfully fast.

You clean up as best as you can, smooth your hair back into place. Your body still feels heavy and sated. Your brain, too, even though it knows what’s coming. You put your clothes back on, and once you tug your cap on, straighten your jacket, you’re the picture of neatness.

As Steve gets dressed, you can feel a draft seeping into the room. It’s probably chilly outside, so from your spot on the dining chair, you shout, “Dress warm, huh? You’re gonna be all over the place for a while, pal. Don’t want you getting sick on me.”  
  
“Quit fussin’, I know,” Steve says, and you watch him dig into the closet, pull his coat out.  
  
When he comes out and grabs his keys, you stand up, grab your bag off the floor. “Ready when you are,” Steve says.

“Wait,” you say, and come closer, drop your hands to his waist, feel his hands slip up your shoulders. The kiss is firmer than the others, far from lazy and soft.

It’s steadying, that’s all, but you aren’t sure who it’s for.

“Okay,” you say. “I think I’m ready now.”  
  
-

The train ride to Bush Terminal is maddening, because one part of you keeps saying you’re gonna be late, and cursing you for not taking the stops into account. You’ll have to dash for the pier if it takes more than an hour for you to get to your stop.

Another part of you is irritated as all hell because there’s _one person_ in your car, and he won’t get off. You would have taken advantage of the quiet if he wasn’t there. Nothing too crazy. Just sat a little closer to Steve, let yourself be more liberal with touching.

He finally gets out about halfway through the ride, and you have about two minutes of peace, just sitting close, before the car fills up with maybe ten GIs, officers, and such. No one really talks to you, just a few nods, since you don’t know each other, but know you’re all headed to the same place.

You let everyone else off first, and Steve follows you out, neither of you saying a word, even as the crowd breaks off. Some take different streets than you’re taking, some jump onto the trolley, and then you’re alone again. Just like that.

It’s the dead of night, and now that the street is quiet, it _feels_ like the dead of night. “I’ll write you when I get in,” you say, nudge Steve a little as you walk, glancing to him for just a second. “Send you a telegram if I can.”

“Just don’t say anything outta the way,” Steve says, and you feel his hand slide up your back. It’s dark and no one’s looking. What do either of you care? “You know how many of your letters get censored, Buck? It’s hard to read ‘em sometimes.”  
  
“Well, I got a lot to say, pardon me,” you shoot back. Steve looks sharper, older in the dark. “Somethin’s on your mind.”  
  
Steve shrugs. “Nothing I can’t handle,” he says, and you’ve got no clue what that means. You doubt he’ll tell you anyway.

You’re about two minutes away from Bush Terminal when you whip around to Steve. “C’mere for a second,” you whisper, and tug him past the edge of an alley. “I ain’t leaving without—”  
  
“Yeah, and I’m not letting you.”  
  
It’s you who’s shoved back against the wall, and the sound you make when Steve kisses you is obscene even to your own ears. It’s too filthy for a goodbye, but once again, what do you care? It’s your last day, your last _minute_ with him. You’ll be damned if you don’t take advantage of it.  
  
“Promise me something,” you huff, fist your fingers in his collar. “Don’t try to enlist anymore. Just do that for me, alright? If I’m gonna come home to something, I want it to be you.”  
  
For a moment, Steve doesn’t say a word. You watch his jaw work, eyes flickering over your face, fingers worrying at the lapels of your jacket. “Yeah, Buck,” he says quietly, eyes locked on yours. “I can do that.”  
  
You puff out a breath you didn’t realize you were holding. Nod, even though Steve can barely see you. “I’ll write you when I dock,” you repeat. “Swear to you.”  
  
“Lookin’ forward to it,” Steve says, and when he kisses you this time, it leaves you a little blindsided with its ferocity. “Now get outta here, quick, before they think you’ve gone AWOL.”  
  
You smile despite yourself, backing out of the alley as Steve does the same. You bite your inner cheek. “You know what I wanna say,” you mutter, stick your free hand in your pocket.  
  
“And you know what I wanna say,” Steve says, and he’s walking backward. He points at you as he does. “Telegram when you dock.”  
  
“Yes sir,” you say, and salute him.

With that, you both turn around at the same time, heading in opposite directions down the street, Steve headed toward home, and you toward a battlefield.

-

Docking in London means almost nothing, since you only get two days there. It’s just a spot to regroup. You’re able to slip away, to send two telegrams that say virtually the exact same thing to Steve, to Rebecca and Ma.

_DOCKED LAST NIGHT AND AM DOING JUST FINE STOP LOTS OF RAIN ITS THE PITS STOP WILL WRITE SOON YOURS JBB_

It isn’t much, but it’s enough. And you followed through on your promise. As you swallow down a pint of warm beer, the familiarity of running into battle returns. You know it won’t be jungles and humidity this time, know it won’t be the Japanese scalping your fellow men or cutting their dicks off while they’re still breathing. This time, it’ll be the krauts and the Italians. It’ll be running through fields and the ruins of cities and hiding from bombs dropped out of the sky.

You may have been losing your head in Guadalcanal, feeling your brain turn to mush in the heat, but something about this side of the war feels like jumping out of the frying pan and into the fire.

-

_Steve,_

_I’m writing to you from a place I can’t tell you too much about, but I think you’d like it if everything wasn’t going to hell. One of these days, the war will end and we’ll come back under our own steam and maybe then I can look at it without wanting to lose my lunch._

_I had a dream about you last night_. _I can’t remember what happened so don’t ask me, but it made me realize how much I miss home. And you. I miss you so bad. I miss your big stupid nose and you yelling at me to quit leaving the window open, and I miss looking at the back of your big head while I’m trying to sleep. I miss waking up to your elbows in my ribs._

_You remember when we were kids and we used to sit on the fire escape of your old apartment when it was hot out? I used to sneak a couple of bottles of Coke while I was stocking the ice box at old man Trentini’s and got to your place before they could get warm and we’d sit out there until we felt like the heat melted us into puddles. What I wouldn’t give to be sitting out there with you now, eating your ma’s apple cake and listening to stray dogs barking up a storm and cars on the road or the drunks on the street and seeing you sat beside me._

_Out here, I almost miss being in the Pacific. It’s cold enough that I am wearing two pairs of socks and it’s doing jack all for me. i know it gets colder in Brooklyn, I’m no fool about that, but it’s different out here, I tell you. The air is different and it doesn’t taste right. It doesn’t smell right either. It’s all open fields and cow s_ _—_ _and the smell of wet grass._

 _Say, if I come home, I think I really might kiss the sidewalks and the subway doors and stay by the docks for a while. I did not think I ever wanted to smell that place again but I do. Old sea water and fish beats corpses and God, are there too many of those. The dead are everywhere. That might be the smell getting stuck in my nose these days. A lot of the krauts and our boys die of infections or illness, and the krauts that_ _do_ _get shot up are already halfway dead. I can’t say I feel any pity for them, but I will say it is an ugly way to go. If i had to choose, i would want to die clean and quick, not shitting my brains out while I’m firing at the enemy. But most likely, I would choose not to die at all. I don’t like jinxing things and talking about when I come back, but I really want a f_ _—ing pastrami on rye and you just can’t get that in ▇▇▇._

_How are you? Having fun in Greenwich (ha ha ha)? Let me know, why don’t you. I’m still waiting on a response from the family, so we’ll see whose letters get to me first._

_I wish I could tell you more about where I’m at. The coffee is incredible, the food is even better, and the dames here love us U.S. boys. I could not tell you why since we are a bunch of loud and boorish a_ _—holes._

_Anywho, I will try to follow up with something nicer if I can get it through the mail. We’ll be moving out soon, but I’ll get your letters somehow. I always do. Don’t make me wait too long for you to write back, you dope._

_Yours sincerely,_

_Bucky_

-

_Buck,_

_I hope this gets to you wherever you are. Is it nice in redacted? I sure hope so. It sounds nice, wherever it is. Quit cussing in your letters and quit saying where you are. By the time they get to me, they’ll be blocks of black and almost impossible to read._

_I’m doing okay. I guess I should tell you I joined the army. It’s not what you think, though. I’m doing propaganda. It keeps me busy and I have to travel a lot for it, so I won’t be in Brooklyn for a while. I don’t know when I’ll be back, but I’m making enough that I’m able to keep the rent going for a while. Right now, I’m in Hoboken, and Jersey is even worse when you’re here for more than two days._

_Sorry this is so short. We’re about to head out ourselves, probably heading to Philly next, but I’ll keep you posted wherever I am and send some pictures when I can._

_Your friend,_

_Steve_

_-_

_“_ _...the krauts to Japan? The Star Spangled Man with a—!”_

You shut McClusky’s radio off, and he reels like you’ve said something nasty about his mother. “What was that for?” he asks.

“I can’t hear that goddamn song anymore,” you say. “I hate that song, I hate Captain America, and I hate the fucking USO.”

“You weren’t complaining when we got wind that Betty Grable was gonna come,” Richardson says.

“Yeah, and did she show up?” you bark. “No, she didn’t. You think they were gonna send her to fuckin’ Norway? Hell no.”  
  
McClusky laughs at that. He’s a string bean of a kid, all bones and a little taller than you, even though he’s no more than eighteen. “Somebody’s in high spirits. This your idea of fun, McClusky?” you snap as you poise yourself at the edge of your foxhole, set your eye against your scope. “Having a Mexican stand off knee deep in the mud?”

You can’t see him clam up, but you know he does, because Richardson and the other boys laugh, say _sarge hates you_ and _your ass is grass billy_.

“I don’t hate McClusky,” you say, and keep your gaze set on the world in front of you, even when you see nothing. “Now can it! All of you! I’m the only thing separating you from a kraut bullet and—”  
  
You see it clatter to the ground, and your breath almost catches, body almost freezing up completely. “GRENADE!” It rips out of your throat, and then your unit is running, jumping out of your foxhole and putting as much distance as you can between yourselves and the bomb before it explodes.

-

It’s months of traveling and fighting. Of blood and bullets and taking shelter in villages and towns that have been blown to smithereens. Some time during that, you take a shine to Tim Dugan and Gabe Jones, the only two men in your unit who don’t make you want to scratch your eyes out. 

The three of you stick together, work like a fine oiled machine. Jones speaks more languages than the two of you can—understands French pretty well, too, and everyone aside from Dugan seems pretty pissed that you have him stick by you most of the time. Dugan’s better at close range, makes a good distraction while you hang back and take care of the krauts from your vantage point.

You can’t write often, and can’t get many letters since you’re almost always on the move lately, but you do your best to write. Keep the mail you do receive close to you, all tied up in the inside pocket of your jacket.

It’s somewhere in Austria that you get a cough you can’t shake. Three days fighting in the rain with barely any food or sleep has begun to weigh on you, and when you hole in the ruins of a house in Kreischberg, you barely touch your rations, unable to get past the sickness in your stomach, the shiver that refuses to stop. As cold as it is, you’re too hot. Your head is aching. Your body feels so weak that you can barely make a fist.

You’ve only had pneumonia once, but it was taken care of quickly, and you barely remember it aside from Becca having to stay at the O’Hallorans, that Sarah managed to help your ma as much as she could, and you had to stay out of everyone’s hair until you were better. 

This is different. It’s sickness, exhaustion, hunger, all hitting you like a ton of bricks.

You try not to think about it. Richardson finds a bottle scotch in the basement of your hideout, and you drink a couple of fingers of it, shove past your sickness as best as you can.

-

It’s like the Solomon Islands all over again, and with the fever tainting your brain, you can practically smell the ocean, hear the caws of the colorful birds that sat in the palm trees over the gunfire and explosions. The Germans are everywhere, and right now, they’re giving you all they’ve got.

“Bucky, behind you!” Dugan shouts. You barely hear him, barely see the kraut coming for you, but you shoot him anyway. You think you might die here, and you’re about to tell Jones and Dugan how goddamn glad you are you had them at your back and—

And then a tank shows up, burning German and American soldiers alike up with bursts of blue light, until nothing but dust remains. Your heart pounds when the barrel of the weapon turns on you, Dugan, and Jones, and you have no clue what to do, no clue what to do but—

“ _DUCK_!” you shout, and drop to the ground, vision flooded in blue.

-

You get all your men to run, to get as far as fucking possible from whoever the hell is coming, because whoever they are, they might be worse than the Nazis.

Your rifle is held close to you, and you clutch the grip so hard it feels like it might crack, and that’s when you come face to face with a soldier, pulling your rifle up to match his pistol. He’s big and broad and dressed in all black, barely illuminated in the dying light of the fires just beyond the tree line. He’s wearing an armband that you initially think is a swastika, but when you look closer, it’s…

...an octopus?

No. A skull, embroidered in blood red, with tentacles stretching beneath it.

“Lay down your weapon, Amerikaner,” he says, accent heavy and grating to your ears. “And I will not be forced to hurt you.”  
  
“Fuck you,” you spit, aim right between his eyes. “You want me to go with you, you’ll have to drag me there yourself.”  
  
“That won’t be a problem,” another voice says, and then the butt of a gun slams into the back of your head.

-

When you come to, your head is aching something terrible, and what must be dried blood is pulling at the skin on back of your neck, turning your hair tacky. There are strong grips on both of your arms, and you can’t hear anything that’s going on. Not really. You feel like your ears have been stuffed with cotton, and as you become more aware of your surroundings, you realize you’re not outside anymore.

The ceilings are high. Industrial. The air smells of smoke and metal, of sickness and something like rot. _It smells like death_ , you think, and blink a thick line of blood from your eyes as your stomach drops to your feet, as you notice the line of men in front of you.

The cells all around you, waiting to be filled. Someone is screaming in a language you don’t recognize. It echoes through the room, leaves you feeling like you’ve been doused in ice water.

“Er ist wach, schick ihn mit den anderen,” someone on your left says, and then you’re shoved forward, colliding into a GI before you hear a voice in your clearing ears, feel an arm on your shoulder.

“Just us, Barnes,” Jones says, and you can barely see with your bleary eyes. You blink hard to clear them. “Better we stick together than get separated.”  
  
“You can say that again,” Dugan mutters, which is useless. He’s loud even when he’s whispering. “Otherwise, we got a snowball’s chance in hell of getting out of here.”

“Silence!” A guard bark, shoves him forward. 

Dugan shakes his head. “Just when I thought things were slowing down,” he says. “We get captured by fucking Nazis.”

When your eyes start cooperating with you, you notice that symbol from the guard’s jacket on the arms of the grunts keeping the other men in check. “I don’t think these are Nazis, but they’re far from good news,” you mutter, voice sounding weak and distant even to your own ears. “You seein’ what I’m seein’, Jones?”

“Jesus,” Jones breathes out. “What the hell are they trying to build?”  
  
“Nothing good, that’s for sure,” Dugan says. “That tank’s even bigger than the monster they came at us with.”

Your blood is running cold in your veins, your fever worming its way back into you, but even when you cut through that, cut through the ache sharpening behind your eyes, you know you and every other man here are fucked. Plain and simple.

-

“In your kennel, you dogs,” the guard says, laughs when he shuts the door with a clang. Dugan bangs on it hard, hissing out a curse.

“It seems our humble abode’s growing a bit crowded,” a voice drawls from the corner, and you turn to find the source of it. He’s sat in the corner, half in shadow beside another man. Both mustached, and both as new as you are to this.

“Aw, well, I’m real sorry to intrude, pal,” you sneer, since a joke is the last thing you want to hear. You’re locked in a goddamn cage like a rat, with German soldiers patrolling up and down the path between the two blocks. “I didn’t know I walked into the King of England’s cell. I’ll ask the kraut outside to move us.”

“Oh, thank Christ,” someone says. American, thankfully. “If I got another Brit in here, I was gonna pull my hair out.”  
  
“Because that’d be worse than this?” Jones shoots back.  
  
You can hear that same scream from earlier rise up again, even more guttural than before, and this time, other men are joining in, screaming for help. Shouting out curses and threats that fall on deaf ears.

The Brit stands up, slow, like he’s been injured, but he’s doing a decent job of hiding it from what you can tell. “Seems you’ve still got some fight in you yet,” he says, and sticks out his hand. “James Montgomery Falsworth. Last of His Majesty’s 3rd Independent Parachute Brigade. That lump over there is Jacques Dernier, and the other American with a mouth as big as yours is James Morita.”

You look warily at his hand, scraped with blood and grime, before you take it. Fine. You’ll break out your full name, too. “Sergeant James Buchanan Barnes of the 107th,” you say, and let go, point to your men beside you. “Private Gabe Jones, Sergeant Tim Dugan. I ain’t here for pleasantries, I’m tellin’ you now. I want to get the hell out of here as soon as possible.”

With that, you lower yourself to the corner of the cell, looking in front of you to find yourself being stared down. Dernier (was that his name?) snores in the corner.

“Think I gotta agree with you, sarge,” Morita says. “Last thing we should be doing is getting used to our surroundings.”

You shut your eyes, lean your head forward, resisting the urge to rub at the lump forming there. “Any ideas on how we get outta here, then?” you ask, half-serious.  
  
“Aside from stealing Wagner’s rifle and going out guns blazing? Not yet.” Nothing, and then, “You can call me Jim, by the way, but I dunno how we’re gonna deal with three Jameses in here.”  
  
“No one calls me James, anyway,” you say, open one eye to look at him before you shut it again. “Bucky works just fine.”

You don’t fall asleep. You couldn’t if you tried, but you know that it’s exhaustion that tugs you down, leaves you useless for what feels like hours.

-

No light comes in here. You aren’t sure what time it is, and your body’s internal clock has been fucked for a month, turned all but useless.

It turns out your captors are called HYDRA, some branch of the Nazis no one knew too much about. It’s all the information you can get, and it takes a couple of days to get your hands on it, considering you, Dugan, Jones, and the rest have to squeeze it out of the men in the cells across and beside you. 

They don’t give you anything else useful, though. Nothing on a way to get out, because according to them, there isn’t one.

That can’t be true, though. You can’t rot away in here, can you? There’s a war going on just beyond these walls, and if you spend it stuck in here, you—

You try not to think about it. Your head hurts enough as it is, brain seeming to pound with every beat of your heart.

-

The guards call you dogs, and that’s how they treat the lot of you. The higher-ups decide to make you all useful, since you’re stashed in a weapons factory, and so they force you all to work until you can’t anymore. 

You watch men, pale with exhaustion, fall to the floor after hours and hours of heavy lifting with no breaks. Guys bigger and stronger than you are begging for rest. British, American, French, and more, you think. You aren’t sure. It’s hard to do much else aside from put one foot in front of the other, these days.

It’s goddamn degrading, sucking up to the krauts. For all of you. Your cell is full of a bunch of guys who have too much stubbornness in them to just bow their heads and say _yes sir_ , but last time any of you did it, you went without rations for almost a week. You’re still feeling the effects of that. The pangs in your stomach that refuse to go away. The dullness to your thoughts.

You haven’t gotten any better, either. Your cough has grown ugly and wet, and you spend your days in a feverish stupor, even while working. _You’ve done this before_ , you tell yourself. _Get it together, Barnes._

You’ve worked sick at the docks, and ended up just fine, but that was different. You were allowed to have breaks. You were able to go home and sleep like a log for the whole evening and wake up feeling like yourself again.  
  
This is making you feel worse. Your fever is trying to burn your brain right out of your skull. Your feet are unsteady, body so weak you can barely hold yourself up, let alone push carts that weigh as much as you do.

You crash into a stack of cargo boxes, sending the fully formed weapons clattering from your cart and across the floor. There’s a curse in German, and then Lohmer—who seems to have had it out for you since you got here—is stomping his way toward you. You didn’t even realize you went down with the cart. You can feel your breath wheezing in your lungs, the sound like crinkling paper.

It’s impossible to hear yourself, to make sense of what’s coming out of your mouth, but you know you ask for a doctor, even though the sane part of you not loopy with sickness knows that’s a bad fucking idea. You’re a prisoner. You know that, and you know prisoners don’t get special requests.

“We do,” Lohmer says, but it sounds like he’s underwater. “I am him.”  
  
“Well, ain’t that lucky for me,” you mutter, but you aren’t sure if he hears you.

That’s when the crumpled shell of the missile comes down on your head. Someone shouts, you aren’t sure who it is then, but you know it’s you who screams when the missile cracks your ribs, when a steel-toed boot collides into the side of your head and the world dissolves into black and red.

-

You’re soaked in blood and sweat, body bruised up so bad you can hardly move it, but it jolts whenever you cough. jolts whenever you shut your eyes and the gore of Guadalcanal appears before you. 

In your dreams, it’s dark, filled with Brooklyn skylines and the echoes of the screams here in the weapons factory. Sometimes, you feel tropical air on your skin, even though you know you’re still on the floor of your cell. You taste the ocean on your tongue, feel the grit of sand in your teeth.

You can hear Dugan and the rest talking, and you know that’s real, as real as someone tugging your eyes open, one at a time before you shove them off. Or maybe, your arm just flops in their general direction.

“Shit.” That’s Morita. “His pupils are dilated. Lohmer got him good. He puts Barnes to work again, he’s kaput.”  
  
No. Fuck, no. You’re not dying here. You’re not dying at the hands of that fucker, you’re not dying in this shithole, no matter how far gone you are. You’ll drag yourself through a garbage chute and roll onto the ground or into a dumpster if you have to, and only then, you’ll let yourself go.

“You can hear me, right, Bucky?” Morita says, and you can see him clearer this time.  
  
“Loud and clear,” you say before your eyes fall shut again.

-

It might be hours, it might be days before you hear Dugan’s voice, loud and booming. “If any of you bastards think you’re getting a hand on him, you’re gonna have to go through us,” he says. “It just ain’t that simple, bud.”

What the hell are they talking about? You’re about to turn, see what the fuss is all about, and Falsworth says, just low enough for you to hear, “Not the time to come to your senses, Sergeant. Stay down.”  
  
“Your friend requires a doctor, does he not?” Another voice says. “You would rather share your cell with a dead man?”

“I know what kinda doctors you people have,” Dugan continues. “He’s not going anywhere with you.”

It’s you. They’re talking about you.  
  
There’s a crack. The butt of a gun against flesh. Again, and again, and again. Falsworth is gone, tugged away, and then, you’re seized under your arms, dragged out of the cell. Everyone’s a mess, bloody and bruised up all because of you. The room is tipping, and—no, it’s not tipping, you’re being tugged up onto something, laid on it. A gurney? Has to be. You can feel cold metal against your back. So cold, and you wish you had your jacket but it’s balled up, being used as a pillow in your cell.

“Jones!” you call, voice slurring. You barely feel the straps buckling over your torso. Jones is looking at you like you’re already dead. “Get these guys the hell out of here if you get a chance. Just do it.”

A guard stops Dugan from bolting from the cell before it’s shut with a clang that makes your head spin. You have to shut your eyes against it, muttering a _christ_ under your breath as the gurney is pushed down the hallway.  
  
“We’re gonna get you outta there, sarge!” It echoes down the block. “Just hang tight!”

-

It’s quieter when you reach the hall. The screams die down, and then they start up again. There aren’t as many voices, though, and they seem to be dying out as soon as they begin.

“Fellas,” you slur. “Hey, fellas, mind tellin’ me—” you hack out a cough. It fills your mouth with phlegm that tastes of blood. “Where are we goin’.”  
  
There are lights whizzing over your head. The wheels on the gurney squeak like mice. The restraints on you are making it difficult to breathe. You’re suddenly wide awake. “You pieces of shit,” you snarl. “Where the hell are you taking me?”  
  
It’s cooler here, now that the crush of bodies on all sides of you are gone. The smell of death is growing stronger, along the scent of blood and something clinical. You know about Nazi experiments. You’ve heard stories, read about it in the papers. _Don’t slip up_ , you remind yourself. _Don’t slip up._

As fucked as your head is, you know to keep your mouth shut. If they find out what you are, you’re as good as dead. They’ll tear you apart. They’ll tear you to pieces and enjoy it even more than they already do.

But they won’t figure it out if you keep your wits about you. They won’t know a thing. You have George Barnes’ eyes and his looks and the only thing Winifred Samuel gave you was her stubbornness, her resilience in the face of hatred, of bigotry. You never imagined being relieved for that.

“MOTHER _FUCKERS_!” you shout, throat tearing at itself. It’s the last dregs of strength you have, and you’ve been saving it. For what, you aren’t sure, but this is as good of a reason as any to make a scene, because the last thing you’ll do is go quietly. You thrash against your bonds, head whipping from side to side. You bang it back against the gurney with a clang. You’re already concussed. What does it matter? Somewhere, a scream is growing louder. “YOU MOTHERFUCKERS!”

You’re cursing up a storm, all your spit and vinegar has been boiling up inside of you since you got here, and now might be your last chance to use it. If you could get free—

“Herr Doktor,” one of the guards say. “Ein anderer Amerikaner. Derjenige über den Lohmer mit Ihnen gesprochen hat.”

“Speak English, Wagner,” another voice says, and then the doctor comes into view. Short, bald and bespectacled, with white lab coat. “He deserves to know of his fate. What is your name, soldier?”  
  
“Go fuck yourself,” you say through gritted teeth. “You can go fuck yourselves with a great big—”

Wagner grabs your dog tags, leaning down to read them. “James B. Barnes, from Brooklyn, New York. Serial number is 32557038.”

“Another from New York,” the doctor says, swivels his beady eyes back to you. “The last two died, but what do the Americans say? The third time is the charm?”

“Something like that,” you say, and the room is spinning again. The guards are still standing on either side of you, as if you’ll claw your way out of your restraints. You squeeze your eyes shut to clear your head. “What do you got planned for me, huh, Fritz? Wanna share it with the class?”

The doctor doesn’t answer. He comes closer, with gloved hands and a little flashlight that he shines in your eyes. You jerk away from his touch, ice cold even through the latex, and he hums thoughtfully. “Only a mild concussion,” he says. “Your cough sounds like pneumonia.”  
  
“So, you’re gonna give me some Aspirin and send me on my way?” you say. You’re sweating through your shirt, shivering so hard your head aches. “Well, gee, maybe you krauts aren’t so bad.”  
  
The doctor looks down his nose at you. “I am Swiss, Private.”  
  
“Oh, that makes this better, then. And that’s Sergeant to you,” you shoot back. You glance around. There are trays of syringes, of scalpels and other instruments that send shivers up your spine. Your hatred of hospitals is rising up your throat, full force. “I earned my fucking rank.”  
  
“And I have earned my doctorate,” the doctor says calmly. “So, you will call me Dr. Zola, Sergeant Barnes.” He steps away, clicks off his flashlight before he looks to the guards. “You may go. I don’t often allow an audience.”  
  
“Yes, Herr Doktor.”

Their footsteps are booming as they exit, the door shutting with a clang you feel in your skull. Your throat is dry and more parched than you realized, The greenish glow of the lights are casting an unreal tinge around the room, casting over Zola’s face, reflecting in his glasses. 

From the corner of your eye, you watch him flip the switch on a tape recorder.

“The date is October 15th, 1943, and the current time is 0800 hours,” Zola says, loud enough for the microphone to pick it up. “Wagner and Engel have brought another patient in from the cell block, one Sergeant James Barnes, sickened with pneumonia and nursing a concussion, but I believe that can be easily taken care of with my methods.”  
  
You swallow thickly when he comes closer. The leather straps restraining you are cutting into your wrists and ankles, pressing down hard on your chest.  
  
“What is your date of birth, Sergeant Barnes?” Zola asks. 

You push a breath out, try to count to five like Ma used to tell you to do when you felt like you were going to be sick. You wonder if you’d choke on your own vomit if it came spewing out of you, if Zola would let you. “10th of March, 1917,” you say, too used to physical exams, to the same questions from other, more reliable sources.

“The patient is twenty-six years of age, the oldest American so far,” Zola continues, as if you haven’t spoken at all. “Further updates will follow, once I put the final touches on the Englishman.”  
  
Your blood runs cold at that. Someone else is here, too. That’s what the screaming was, then. When you shudder, you aren’t sure if it’s your fever spiking again, or fear clutching you by the throat.

Zola leaves the room, and it takes only a minute for the screaming to start up again, growing louder, deeper, catching on sobs and pleas before starting up again and again, leaving your head pounding, your heart throwing itself against your ribs so hard it feels like they’re cracking even further.

And then the screaming stops, plunging you into deafening silence. It never starts up again, and soon enough, you smell something burning.

No, not something, _someone_. It grows more acrid, rotten, stinging your nose and your eyes. Christ, you can taste it. _You can taste it in the air_.

When you throw up, it’s all bile, running down your chin, on your chest, spilling on the gurney and soaking into your hair as it burns a hole through your throat. You groan, trailing into a whine as you try to breathe, as your teeth clack together with chills.

The smell never fades away, not even when you finally pass out.

-

The next day, Zola hooks you up to two IVs, one to keep you from getting dehydrated, and another pumping you full of antibiotics, fighting the illness in your body, breaking you out of your fever. There must be something else in there, too, though, because you’re still just as slow, limbs floppy and useless. Your thoughts have long since slowed to a crawl, gone loopy and disjointed.

Zola has an assistant—Lange—with him, and he’s pressing on your torso, sending shocks of pain up your body. You want to scream, but you couldn’t if you tried.

“How does it feel when I press here?” he asks, and applies pressure to the left side of your ribcage.  
  
“Hurts,” you mutter, tongue thick in your mouth.

“More than the right side?” Lange asks.

Your blink can’t even be called a blink. It takes ages for you to open your eyes again. “No.”

“The sergeant’s ribs are merely cracked, Dr. Zola,” Lange says, turning away from you. “And healing well on their own. What is the next step?”  
  
He steps away, and you hear them conversing in German. You grit your teeth, try to flex your slack fingers. You can’t even do that. You squeeze your eyes shut again. You’re not a praying man anymore. You haven’t been in so long, but you can smell incense, feel the beads of the family rosary in your hands when you think _devel, smilujil pe muro duša_.

But you don’t think it at all. You can feel your throat vibrating, your lips moving, and that’s when Zola and Lange stop talking.

“Mein Gott,” Lange breathes out. “Der Sergeant ist ein Ziguener.”

You don’t need to know German to understand what he’s saying. When you glance at them, they don’t hide their shock, and you don’t hide your fear, because your secret is already out. It’s _out_. You’ve been ruined by your own stupidity, and now you’re going to pay the price for it.

“I’d only heard of the gypsies emigrating to America, but I can’t say I’ve seen the evidence for myself,” Lange says, brows knit together. “He doesn’t look like the rest of them, does he?”  
  
Zola shakes his head. “He does not,” he says. “Barnes is an English name, so the corruption must come from the mother’s side.”

Another wave of bile rises in your throat, and you barely swallow it down.

“Mischling,” Lange says, like the word itself filth. “It’s hard not to wonder how infested America must be with these vermin. He should be sent to Düsseldorf with the others. Terminated with the rest of his—”

“He may be useful to us yet,” Zola says, holds a hand up. You can practically see Lange’s jaw snap shut, and then you focus your eyes on the ceiling, on the lights swinging above you. “Come with me.”

And then they’re gone, shutting the door behind them, leaving you to wonder if whatever Zola plans to do kills you like it did the Brit in the next room.

If you pray for anything, floating in a drug induced haze, it’s for a quick and painless death.

-

You aren't sure how much time has passed. It could be hours, it could be days, but you know you aren’t drowsy anymore, don’t feel so sick. You’re still shivering, and there’s a sheet of sweat covering you from head to toe. Something smells like piss. It might be you. 

Christ, you can _feel_ the grime on your skin. Layers and layers of it building from the night you were captured.

“You’re awake,” Zola says without turning. You can see him filling a syringe, a sickly blue fluid flowing inside. It almost glows. “I was hoping the anesthetics would wear off by now.”  
  
“What.” Your voice is weak and reedy. You swallow around your parched throat. You haven’t eaten in so long, haven’t drank anything, not with the saline drip pumping through your veins, as if that’s _enough_ . “What the hell is that?”  
  
“Something of my own creation,” Zola says, taking a step closer. The needle is enormous. “Nearly perfected.”  
  
“I’m so glad for you,” you say, but with how broken and slurred your words are, it has no bite. Zola seems to be tuning you out, anyway. He tugs your sleeve up your forearm, swabs a spot on your skin before he taps air bubbles from the needle of the syringe. 

You’ve never liked needles, never even liked looking at them.

You want to panic. You want so badly to keep asking what the hell is in the syringe, want to beg for anything else than whatever it is, but you won’t. You won’t give him the satisfaction, you won’t let him—

Zola gets the needle into your vein and it _pushes, pushes, pushes,_ deeper into your arm, taking your breath away. The pain is deep and visceral, coiling in your guts, flooding your vision with black spots as a sound rips from your throat —low and muffled through your gritted teeth. You know you’re imagining that you feel the drug entering your veins, but you _feel_ it. It almost feels thick in your bloodstream, like it’s physically weighing you down and all you can think is _please make it stop, please, god, please make it stop_.

It does. Your arm is being bandaged with a swab of cotton and tape, and even that makes you grunt in pain.

“What n-now, huh?” you grit out, aware of your pulse picking up. Your hand is shaking, clenching into a fist. “What’s next, Fritz?”

“Now,” Zola says. “We wait.”

He seems pleased. Maybe you reacted the way he wanted you to. You wonder if this is what he gave the other guy, if this is what made him scream like he’d descended into hell.

Within ten minutes, you get your answer.

Your body is on fire, like there’s a flame in your belly, rising up and charring your insides, turning your blood to steam. You wonder if you smell like the Brit in the incinerator. Like roasting meat, like burning flesh.

The scream that rises up from you must be blood-curdling, because you can feel it in your blocked ears. You can feel your throat shredding itself to ribbons, your head slamming against the gurney.

You don’t have to look to know Zola is watching intently.

-

You can only count the days by his logs. It’s been three days since he’s injected you with whatever abomination he created, and you’re even more terrified of what’s to come next, because you don’t feel any different. Once the screaming stopped, you felt like nothing changed. 

Was something supposed to change?  
  
You’re injected again that same night, and that time, Lange is there. That time, you do beg. You do exactly what they want, and when Lange laughs at your screams, you want to rip yourself out of your restraints and rip his throat out so he’ll never laugh again.

-

After the third injection, Zola starts pumping you with other things, too.

He sets you on drips that make the light ripple, and make the air taste strange, thick and viscous against your teeth. Every breath feels like your last. You’re covered in beetles that burrow under your skin, crawl down your throat. And then they turn to smoke and drift away. 

The next day, he gives you something that makes time slow down and speed up around you. And after that, a sedative so strong it takes you two full days to wake up.

That’s when the other experiments begin.  
  
There are scalpels and Zola cuts you _everywhere_. Cuts through the soles of your feet, angry lines up your shins and your arms and your chest, and you bleed and bleed and bleed until you pass out.

You always wake up. No matter how badly you wish his next idea kills you, you always wake up.

-

Your bonds must have loosened with all of your thrashing, and you find a window to get out of them. You rip them off like nothing and bolt down a hallway, getting lost in the twists and turns, dizzy but sure of what you need to do: get out, free as many men as you can and find a way back to base, get reinforcements to help the others. 

It’s all so clear, all so neat in your head, but then a pair of guards in black armor are blocking your path, and another pair appear behind you and grab you by your biceps. They drag you back the way you came, kicking and cursing and screaming like a banshee, smearing blood all over the place.

There’s another voice somewhere, shouting for help. Another subject, maybe. Lange doing his work on whoever it is. You hope it’s none of your guys. Hope they’re still assembling guns, or finding a way out of this hellhole.

An operating table waits for you in the medical ward, with enforced restraints. You thought Zola would punish you for running, but as the guards strap you down tight, he only says, “An excellent feat, Sergeant Barnes, but our work together is far from over. We’re making more progress than you believe.”

 _Progress_. You feel like you’ve been flayed from head to toe. Your thoughts are disjointed and jagged. You can barely keep track of time anymore. How is that progress?

-

“I believe,” Zola begins, and at this point, those two words are enough to chill you to your core. “We will do well with one final injection.”  
  
Injection of what? God, your brain is slowing down, like you’re burning yourself out, sickness working its way back into your body. Injection of—?

“No,” you grunt, chest rising and falling rapidy, breath turning wheezy. “No. Cut me up, give me whatever the hell made my head spin, but—”  
  
“You have no choice in this matter,” Zola explains. He already has the syringe. It’s brighter this time, glowing even more intensely., which means he tweaked it further, made it more potent. What will it do to you this time? “I am the doctor, you are the patient.”  
  
With that, he slips the needle into your arm. You never got used to it, and this time, you stop breathing completely. You aren’t sure when you start again, but you know the pain is growing more intense, so hot it almost feels cold. Your eyes shut tight on their own accord.

“Perhaps the serum is cleansing your blood, Sergeant,” Zola says over your heaving breaths turning to whimpers, and even then, you barely hear it. Not with the roar in your ears. “Do you feel cleansed? Is the filth being driven from your veins?”  
  
“Fuck you,” you sob, bitter tears squeezing from your eyes, all restraint gone out the window. “Fuck you, fuck you, fuck—”

Another wave of pain, white-hot, shattering your bones to pieces. You taste blood in your mouth, and you lose all awareness as another howl, beastly and deep in your chest, overtakes you.

-

The room is empty when you come to your senses. The lights are on. Zola is nowhere to be found. 

A familiar voice keeps speaking to you, saying _buck, look at me, come on, bucky, i’m right here._

You don’t answer. You don’t answer because you don’t know who it is. You can’t trust your surroundings, can’t trust anyone, and all you can think is, _who the hell is Bucky?_

-

The answer comes back, minutes or hours or days later, and you know you can’t forget it again, so you take to muttering it over and over and over again, until it’s the only thing you know how to say.  
  
“Sergeant James Buchanan Barnes, 32557038.” 

Your voice is barely there, but you don’t stop, not even for a second. You think you say it in your sleep now, too.

-

Time passes in the strangest way, stretching and shrinking. You remember things in snatches. Zola cutting at your flesh again. Injecting you with something so strong it makes your head feel tender, makes your body feel like it’s going to break into pieces.

You’re given something else that makes you hallucinate. _32557038_ , you remind yourself. Name and number, again and again and again. It feels like you’ve been here for decades, like you’ve spent your whole life on Zola’s operating table, dreaming of a life that never existed.

You’ll die here. You know you will. You’ll never see your family again, never get to go home and tangle yourself with Steve again. You’ll never see Ma again. You’ll never see Rebecca again, never be there to see her life progress, see her with children, growing old and happy.

The room is empty, which is odd, since you’re in the middle of an experiment, and Zola never leaves at times like these.

You’re still spiraling with whatever he gave you this time. The walls breathe. Your restraints are turning to seagulls and swirling above your head, and then they’re turning to worms and sinking into dirt high above your head. 

You can smell seawater and cigarette smoke and fish and your hands are smudged in ink, then you're in the ocean at Coney Island and you've swam out too far even though Ma told you not to, and now you're drowning, choking, head cresting the surface and being greeted with the sight of Guadalcanal’s white beaches soaked in red. A head is floating near you, and it’s funny, because it looks a little like you, if your eyes were gouged out and your head was split open. Maybe it is you, after all.

Then, blood. So much blood, and you can’t stop thinking about it as it fills the ocean, but then there’s no ocean at all. Your back is on hard concrete. You’re slamming your fists into Tommy Corcoran’s face. You’re twelve years old and lying curled up by the ikana in your old apartment, praying for Steve to make it through the night. 

You’re not you, now. You’re on the floor of a garage with a car on top of you, chest crushed, and you’re choking on your blood just like your father did so many years ago. Are you feeling what he felt? Are you seeing through his eyes? Feeling his insides crush and his heart stop?

You can’t be. That isn’t real, but what is real?

The pain you feel is real. The tears are leaking from your eyes are real. The fear, the helplessness caught in your throat is real. These days, it seems that’s all you’re made of. You’re just a lump of flesh and muscle that only knows suffering, only knows cruelty.

There’s no one here. You can’t see or hear anyone, so you call out for help, but you can’t bear to speak anymore, so maybe thinking it will work. There are other, more important things to remember. To say. You can’t lose them again. 

Your lips utter your name and your serial number, but in your head, you call out for God, even though he seems to have turned a blind eye to you. You call out for the devil, just in case. You call out for your mother. You call out for Rebecca, for Steve, for Sarah Rogers, for the father you barely knew, and whoever else might hear you.

You may have nothing now, you may be nothing now, but you have one thing left that belongs to you, and that thing is time.

So, you wait. You feel yourself slip, but you keep saying your own name, and you keep on waiting.

-

It's Steve who hears you.

Of course, it's Steve.

-

Or, maybe it isn’t.

Your head is still fucked with whatever Zola injected you with. You learned, vaguely, which syringe did what. The biggest held his serum. Concoction. Whatever the hell he called it. 

The smaller ones were harder to gauge, but you know the sedative made you feel cold from the inside out, and the hallucinogen felt like molten heat, settling into your veins just before the visions began.

You’ve never seen things like this, though. Your hallucinations have been elaborate, left you questioning even the smallest of things, but you know you’ve never _escaped_ in any of them, and you’ve definitely never been rescued.

The stranger wearing your best friend’s face has slung your arm around his broad shoulders, and he’s looking at you with his stupid dope of a face, like he’s happy to see you. Your mouth moves and you say something to him, and he has some kind of ridiculous response, just like the real Steve would, and some part of you wants to believe it’s him, but you can’t.

You can’t be glad. You can’t trust this imposter, or anything else in front of you, but it all feels so real. The heat of a fire at your back. Your shaking legs, your grip on the metal banister of a flight of stairs. Your grip on a stiff leather jacket. The figures in front of you. Zola, and a guy you’ve never seen before but God, if Zola’s here, this has to be real, because he never makes it into any of your visions.

The guy—a Nazi, a HYDRA officer, whatever the fuck he is, comes at Steve, and Steve, fucking idiot that he is, punches him with a strength you’ve never fathomed him having. The guy’s face should be a mess, but he doesn’t even twitch.  
  
You wish you had a gun. Wish you could fire it into him, and Zola, and maybe shove it into your own mouth afterward.

The fire is growing from below, and it feels like you can taste the char of burning flesh again, and maybe you can. The heat is so intense, it must be real. As real as the hand in the center of your back.

You believe it for about five seconds, and then the Nazi rips his own face off.

-

The Nazi and Zola are gone as quickly as they appeared, and that’s when the room turns to an inferno. Flames are licking at the walls and swirling below the catwalk, but somehow, you make it across, like a tightrope walker in a circus. 

Steve is on the other side of it, alone, and he tells you to run. Whether it’s him or not, you’ll be damned if you’re leaving anyone alone to die in this hellhole. If the last thing you ever see is a hallucination of Steve Rogers jumping across a chasm of fire, then that’s just fine.

It’s better than dying on Zola’s table.

-

You manage to get outside. There are voices, screaming and whooping and cursing. There’s the pepper of gunfire. Your lungs are burning, soot coating your tongue, making your spit taste acrid and thick. You hawk phlegm on the ground, cough into your forearm, squeezing your eyes shut before you rub the ash from your face, listening to Steve’s voice in your ear saying something you can’t make out.

You’re passed a canteen and you drink from it greedily, forcing yourself to stop when your stomach feels like it’s about to burst. “Sorry,” you mutter when you notice there’s not much water left. Wipe your lips on your filthy sleeve.

A hand rubs your back, squeezes your shoulder. “It’s okay, you need it more than I do.”  
  
“Christ,” you choke out. The face in front of you is just as darkened with ash, smeared with sweat and wearing the _stupidest_ helmet you’ve ever seen. “What the fuck are you wearing?”

And then you’re laughing. 

It bubbles from your chest, from your raw throat, and maybe you’re in shock. Maybe you’re just finally giving into the mania that’s been trying to ensnare you. _“_ Sorry,” you manage to say, wipe grimy tears from your face. “Sorry. I’m just bustin’ your chops, pal.”  
  
Even in the dark, you can see color rising up in blotches around Steve’s face. Above you, the air is filled with smoke, and it’s turning to little white birds, circling around the moon and flying away. _Hey,_ you think _, we’re all free now._

You don’t have time to look at it very long, because the ground is rumbling and Steve is saying _we gotta get outta here buck_ , and tugging you away from the building so quickly, the world is turning to a smudge around you. You’re not laughing anymore, but there’s a grin on your face that refuses to fade.

-

The sky is velvet black and rippling with heat, the ground continuing its monstrous rumble beneath your feet. 

By some miracle, you find Dugan, which means you find Falsworth and Jones, Dernier and Morita. They stare at you like you’re a ghost, but then Dugan says, “Jesus Christ, Buck, I thought we lost you,” and tugs you in for a hug you think might crush your ribs, but it doesn’t hurt it all. Hell, you’re relieved for it. You take Jones’ face in your hands, slap him on the cheek when he does the same to you. The rest grab your shoulders, slap you on the back.

“Gotta agree with Dum Dum,” Morita says, jerks his head toward Dugan. That’s a new name. If you remember it, you doubt you’ll let him live it down. “Scared the hell out of us, sarge.”  
  
“Had to come hold down the fort somehow,” you say, voice still barely there.  
  
“Hey, Bucky,” Dugan calls as you all move out. There are hundreds of men behind you, and they’re all groaning and talking and screaming. “You just never planned to mention you’re best pals with Captain America?”

“Captain America?” you echo, then look ahead to the man ahead of the rest of you, talking intently with Falsworth and Jones, coming up with some kind of a game plan. Your eyes have adjusted to the dark, and there’s something in the guy’s expression. His beak of a nose, and the way his hair falls stubbornly from under his helmet. “That’s—the USO guy. With the dancers?”  
  
“The same one,” Morita says. “I thought he was kidding when he told us who he was.”  
  
Your mouth is drier than before. Sure, the dirt is pulsing beneath your feet and weeds are growing through your boots, but you know that aside from that, this is actually happening.

Steve is real. Everyone else is real, and you’re _out_. You could scream with joy, fall to your knees with it, but you don’t, because now all you want to do is punch Steve in his big stupid face and ask _just what the hell he’s doing here._

-

Everything speeds up after that. The bite of the wind is steadying you. The sense of order around you makes you feel sane, and somehow, you’re contributing some of that order, taking on crowds while others do the same. Your voice is hoarse and scratchy, but you raise it anyway as you whip the men into shape. Someone hands you a rifle, and you sling the strap over your shoulder, clutch it like a lifeline. 

When a march begins, your eyes scan the trees for assailants that aren’t there, for snipers in the trees and soldiers hiding in the brush, but there are none. They must have burned up in the factory. Good fucking riddance.

The feeling of ants on your skin begins to fade after a while, meaning you’re sweating the drug out. Meaning it’s been at least, what, twelve hours since you were injected with it? You know it was seven in the morning when you were stuck with a needle, due to Zola’s log, and he took notes periodically, returning in intervals to see if there were any changes to your body, to your hallucinations.

Your whole body feels like an exposed nerve as you continue marching, but you don’t care. That’s how you know it’s wearing off. You’re itching all over, and now you can finally scratch at your skin, get that feeling away without the goddamn bonds in the way.

Right now, you’re walking silently with men from your unit. There are other Allied soldiers, but the majority seems to be the 107th, which is surreal. Christ. You thought they’d all died, but here they are. It makes sense to stick by them right now, not let them feel so goddamn lost in all of this.

You’re on Steve’s six, too. Your paranoia isn’t something you can let go of, the feeling of danger lurking over your shoulder, even with your men at your back, you can’t get rid of it.

Hours pass, and when the sky lightens, when the temperature drops, you catch up to Steve at the front of it all, faster than you thought you would. You thought your lungs would burn, that you’d have to tell him to wait up since his strides are so long, but you don’t. It has to be adrenaline. It’s magnifying your senses, sharpening your reflexes.

“Steve,” you say over the sound of the trucks carrying the wounded. “Steve, it’s been what, four hours? These guys gotta be beat. They’ve barely eaten, been living like animals. They need to rest.”

He turns to face you, and—

Oh. 

Oh, it really _is_ him.

In the deep blue light of dawn, you can see him just fine. See the familiar shadows to his face, the cut to his cheekbones, the pinch between his dark brows. For just a second, there’s no war at all, because you’re just looking directly into Steve’s eyes, the rest of the world fading away.

“You wanna tell them?” he asks you.

You shake your head. “They’re all looking at you like the sun’s shining out your ass,” you say in a terrible attempt at humor. Steve barely smiles at it, his face strangely wistful. Hollow. You can barely look at him, stomach twisting up painfully. _What_ _the hell happened to you, pal?_ “You tell ‘em.”

There’s a brick wall between the two of you, like it’s been a decade since you left him at Bush Terminal. It certainly feels like it.

Despite that, he nods, and then he turns around, stopping in his tracks, and tells everyone to settle down for now. Plenty of men—including Dugan and the rest of your group (is it your group?) —offer to take watch, and so does Steve.

You leave them all to it, since you damn well didn’t offer yourself up, and head into the woods with a group of GIs. The more people, the better. You’d rather sleep next to a bunch of your guys from your unit than alone right now.

-

You aren’t quite sure how long you sleep, but when you wake, the sky has lightened to a dull grey. The clouds are dark and heavy with an inevitable storm, and you know you’ve seen worse, know you’ve battled through worse and that you might be okay, but some of these guys are so sick, so weak, a cough or a sniffle might kill them. 

You wonder if it’ll get to Steve, too, and then you think of how goddamn nice it is to worry about someone else’s life again, to stop worrying so desperately about your own.

-

You still haven’t spoken to Steve. Not really. You marched over the Italian border right beside him, you help him wrangle everyone else into place, and do rounds, appoint the men with things to do. You weed out the medics, get them to stay with the wounded. You find other, higher ranking men, and leave them on your six, to watch the hundreds of men behind you.

But aside from that, aside from mandatory interaction, there’s nothing to say to each other. Like you’re both too yellow-bellied to break to silence. Steve silently passes you extra rations when there’s a break in your marching, but you just end up giving them back to him. You’re not all that hungry, thin as you are, and you’re a little more concerned about the pack of smokes hidden in the can.

When you light one, when the smoke fills your lungs, you almost moan. You haven’t had one since pneumonia first started to creep in, and now that it’s gone, now that you’re home free, there’s no point in denying yourself. You smoke the whole of your rations, lighting one cigarette off the burning butt of another.

There’s a pair of eyes on the back of your head, but you’d recognize those footsteps anywhere, and you don’t even turn around when you say, “I’m takin’ this watch, kid.” You release a flume of smoke through your nose. “Go get some shut-eye. You need it.”

You can practically hear it when Steve swallows. “I’m fine, Buck,” he says. “I mean it.”  
  
“You haven’t slept in two goddamn days,” you say sharply, take another drag before you turn, exhaling a cloud as you step closer to him. “You think I’ve gone blind or something, Rogers? I’m keeping my eye on you. Always do.”

“Guess you got eyes in the back of your head, then,” Steve says, and his voice isn’t raised, but there’s an edge to it that surprises you. “”Because you haven’t looked me in the eye since we got out of Kreischberg.”  
  
“We have men dying on us, pal,” you say, which is true, but it’s not a good answer. “Parsons and Garner have gangrene, Morita says O’Brien’s got septicemia. Probably won’t make it through the night. Now ain’t the time for catch-up.”

You’re not cold. Anything, even the half-frozen ground, is warmer than that goddamn table, than the scalpels and needles tearing at your skin but you’re shivering now, so hard your knees buckle, so hard you drop your cigarette in the mud.

“Don’t you gotta go boost the morale, Cap?” you say with clattering teeth, and maybe Steve thinks that’s all it is, messing with your voice. Maybe he can’t hear the hostility in your tone. “Go do that, maybe. Let a man have some peace and quiet.”  
  
“How am I supposed to do that?” Steve asks seriously. “Tell me that, Buck, what do you want me to do?”

“I don’t care, as long as it ain’t here,” you say. You’re pointing a finger in his face now. You’re so angry you could spit. Your vision is swimming. You feel like a bucket of ice has been poured into your stomach. “You stormed a goddamn enemy base _alone_. Dropped into Assfuck, Austria for what? To save a couple sorry souls?”

“It wasn’t right leaving anyone behind,” Steve says. You think of Dorothy Branson and a couple of guys lifting her skirt up in the schoolyard, and Steve busting each of them a good one for it. _Fucking martyr_. “And, Buck, if there was even a _chance_ that you were alive, I had to come. I couldn’t leave you here.”

“Yeah, well,” you say without looking at him, shrugging at the ground. You can’t even glance at him without feeling ill. “You shouldn’t have come.”

“So, I should have left you and everyone else there?” Steve snaps. “Run around bases acting like a damn chorus girl?”

“This ain’t about you,” you snarl. “We don’t have enough rations, don’t have the right equipment to help anyone. More than half these guys are dead men walking, so lemme be the one to tell you that it wasn’t _worth it_. We’re gonna get back to base with less people than we left with and I don’t know if I’m gonna end up being—“

“You’re gonna be fine,” Steve says firmly, but you don’t know who he’s trying to reassure, you or himself. “You’re gonna be okay, Bucky, I swear.”

You take a step back from him, shake your head. “You don’t know that,” you whisper. “You don’t _know_ that.” 

You know you’re shaking. You don’t think you can stop. Your head is spinning, so you shut your eyes tight, but you immediately open them because you aren’t sure if any of this is real. Aren’t sure if you’re gonna wake up back on the operating table next time you blink. You look into the blackness behind the trees, watch your breath turn to clouds in rapid succession. 

“You don’t—I’m fucked up,” you gasp, eyes swiveling wildly from Steve’s face to his massive, new body. “They fucked me up real good, and I don’t know what they did, but I don’t feel—I feel like they ripped me apart and put me back together all wrong.”

It’s like he forgot something. Maybe an ear or a few fingers, or maybe he screwed your head back on wrong, lost one of your eyes and gave you a new one.

Steve is trying to come closer, and you flinch back, unable to help yourself. His face falls. “Buck—”

“You wanted to see the war, Steve?” you say, voice raised, arms opening wide. “Here it fucking is! This is it! Does this look like fighting the good fight to you? Doing your part? We’re all sick, we’re all dying. We don’t have enough rations, and we don’t have enough medics or supplies to do anything worthwhile. If the krauts find our fucking parade, we are _fucked_ , you hear me?”

You want to feel guilty for this. You want so badly to feel guilty, and a part of you does, but your anger is getting in the way. “I told you not to enlist,” you say, lower this time. “I told you not to—you _promised_ me you wouldn’t and now look what they—Steve, what did they _do_ to you?”  
  
That looks like it hurts. You expect him to fight back, for you two to go at it tooth and nail like you always used to, but he doesn’t, and that’s even worse. “I enlisted the night we went to the Stark Expo, and I _let them_ do this to me,” he says, and his voice is rough. “If I didn’t, you’d still be in that lab.”

And then he’s gone, walking away from you with mud squelching beneath his boots. You let him go. You don’t think you know how to run after him anymore.

-  
  
Even after that, you stick together the entire trek. 

Even after that, Steve continues to make you eat his rations along with your own, and even though you know he needs to eat, too, every shitty bite of powdered eggs or your double helping of dinner makes you feel better. Makes you feel human. Like your body isn’t aching so bad.

Now that you think about it, it’s not aching at all.

You might be imagining the track marks from the endless injections disappearing from your skin, so you don’t breathe a word about it. Not even to Steve, not even when he notices you moving easier than before.

By the time you make it back to base in Azzano, it’s been four days and you’ve lost fifty-two men. They were buried in unmarked graves across Italy, given the send-offs they deserved.

A crowd gathers around. The other half of your unit, the men who made it back are cheering. In the midst of it all is Colonel Phillips (not cheering), along with some dame with dark curls and painted red lips called Carter, and she looks at Steve like he’s got the whole goddamn universe hidden in his eyes.

You shout out, _“Hey! Let’s hear it for Captain America!”_ so the cheering starts up again, but you feel scooped clean. Like you’re fading around the edges, even though you’re safe now. Safe as you can be. 

Steve looks at you, like he’s shocked you’re even breathing near him, but then he’s looking back at Carter, and you try not to feel resentful, but that’s exactly what you are. Angry and cold, a shell of your former self.

If there was anything good left in you, Zola’s serum flushed it out. Poisoned you, like an infection settling into your blood.

Nurses are weaving their way through the crowd, and one appears in front of you, asks where you hurt. You’re not hurt anywhere. You’re not bruised anymore. There are no more cuts on you. Your head is clearer. You think your ribs have healed completely. Hell, your feet barely hurt.

You definitely look a little worse for wear, since you’re covered in mud, in blood, you stink something awful, and you haven’t slept in God knows how long, but other than that, you think you’ll live.

So, you say, “I’m fitter than a fiddle, sweetheart,” and give her something like your old smile. Like the ones you used to toss to Marianne and Terri and Bernadette and all the others, but it’s empty. Cold like winter wind on your teeth.

They want to check you out anyway, so you end up following her reluctantly, and run your mouth on and on, even when your throat aches from talking, because no one here is gonna yell at you to shut your trap in German. 

They don’t give you any needles. There are no drugs that make your skin crawl or your brain turn to sludge. There are no beady eyes staring down at you, poking and prodding like you’re some kind of goddamn science experiment.

The nurses might be a little impatient with you since you keep on flapping your gums at them, but they _hmm_ and _ah_ and _I see_. They allow you to leave after a swallow of what seems to be an extremely strong version of Aspirin, since you won’t take anything else.

The minute you’re out, you dry heave in a bush, fingers digging into the earth, nails splitting against it.

-

Everyone else showers, and gets fresh clothes, and spends a night in the medical tent, but not you. That’s the last place you want to be.  
  
You eat in the mess tent, since you’re starving for actual food, and you don’t look up when Steve comes by, when the others talk to him or say hello. You duck your head down and don’t look up when you hear his voice mingled with Agent Carter, which is just—

You don’t know what to think about it.

You can’t stick a claim on him just because of what happened before you shipped out, can you? You’ve never done that to anyone, you never got cut up about it when it was any of your girls or even Andy fucking O’Reilly.

Then again, this is Steve. Steve, whose letters you kept in your pocket during the heat of battle—God, your _letters_. From him, from your family, they’re all burnt up in that factory. This is Steve, who you’ve been mooning over for half your life.

But now, he’s mooning over someone else, looking at Carter like she’s got him on some invisible string. Your hash turns to sawdust in your mouth, and you drink your coffee in quick, massive gulps, feeling it run down your neck. 

You don’t mind the way it scorches your tongue and the inside of your chest, because you haven’t felt this warm in months.

-

By nightfall, the showers have emptied, and you use that as your chance to get cleaned up. God knows you need to, and right now there’s no one here to rush you. 

You brush your teeth three times. You wash your face until your skin squeaks. You don’t bother shaving. Your hands are too shaky for it, but it sure would be funny that after everything, you accidentally nick your jugular and die like that, twitching on the floor in a pool of blood.

You turn the water as hot as you can bear, which turns out to be pretty damn hot, and scrub your skin until it’s raw and pink. And then you do it again. And again. You wash vomit and blood and dirt from your hair, wash the filth from between your legs, from your feet—which are miraculously in tact, even after marching in the rain in soggy, blood-soaked for a full day.

No cuts. No track marks. No bruises. Your skin is remarkably unblemished, and the thought of that is so terrifying, it almost paralyzes you right there, but you can’t spiral now. The last thing you want is to be found by someone in a naked, traumatized heap.

You dry off quickly, pull your clothes on, stuff your feet into your socks and boots. The callouses on your heels are gone, too. The thick, cracked white skin is now smooth and pink, so soft that the wool of your sock rubs against it uncomfortably.

You’re able to breathe a little easier now that you’re clean, and you’ve just realized that you haven’t even thought of trying to write home.

Of course, you could say you had no time for it, but that’s not you. That’s the furthest thing from you. You’ve written home sick and tired, covered in kraut blood and brains, and now, you can barely summon the willpower to even _think_ about it.

Maybe it’ll take your mind off of all of this. Maybe Ma and Rebecca know you’re alive and well now, and not rotting in a shallow grave somewhere in Austria.

You light another cigarette and think about it. You’ll have to find a bunk somewhere in the barracks, and even though that’s the last place you want to be right now, you’d rather sleep with a bunch of knuckleheads talking and yelling and jerking off than sleep be left to your own devices.

It hasn’t rained in hours, and the sky is clear, bright, and cold. Moonlight shines over the base. It’s far from beautiful, but it’s a comfort to see. It’s been something of a temporary home for you, and even though Azzano is far from the crystal waters and sun-soaked buildings of Palermo, it’s somewhere to lie your head.

You’re killing your cigarette, stomping it out when you notice a bigger tent, a few feet away from the barracks for everyone else. It’s not Colonel Phillips, not any other member of the brass, since they’re all on the other side of the base, and you have a feeling Agent Carter is there, too.

You lean in, trying to listen to what’s going on inside. You don’t know what you expect to hear, don’t know if you expect to hear Steve’s voice or the scratch of a pencil against paper or—

The tent flap is wrenched open. It catches you so off-guard, you jump back a few inches, biting back a curse, heart pounding. When Steve does the same, you almost laugh, but you swallow it down, hand to your chest. “Shit. Scared the hell outta me, kid.”  
  
“Sorry,” Steve says, hushed, looking uncomfortable as all hell. “What are you doing here?”  
  
It’s just a question. Not an accusation. _It’s just Steve_ , you remind yourself. It’s just Steve.

You shrug. “You up for company?” you ask.  
  
Something appears to lift off his shoulders when the words leave your lips, and he nods. “Yeah,” he says, opens the flap even further. “Yeah, come on, get in here.”  
-

Steve’s tent is far from enormous, but it’s roomy. His bed is standard, just big enough for one person, and expertly made, the corners tight and uniform.

You whistle, low and long. “Nice digs,” you say, turn in a slow circle with your hands in your pockets. “Perks of being Captain America, I guess.”

Steve shrugs stiffly. “I told the brass I’d be fine bunking with everyone else, but they insisted on this,” he says.

“Well, you’re a celebrity now, aren’t ya?” you joke, and that seems to be the wrong thing to say, because he goes red from his throat to his ears, eyes settling somewhere near your feet. You sigh, shut your eyes for a second. “Look, I just...I came to apologize, alright?”

“What?” Steve says, face tensing up. He’s coming closer. “Buck, you’ve got nothing to apologize for.”  
  
“Yeah, I do, actually,” you argue. Christ, it’s like stepping into the looking glass, like you’re in goddamn Wonderland because here you are, bickering with Steve over nothing, only Steve is one hundred pounds heavier, an inch taller than you, and you’re having it out on an army base instead of your apartment, which is where he _should_ be right now. “Steve, you didn’t even have any weapons, and you came in there, did what no one else had the guts to do, and I didn’t even—”  
  
You grit your teeth, guilt finally washing over you, twisting up your insides, burning behind your eyes. “I know I’ve been rotten with you, and I’m sorry for that. I mean it,” you continue, sit on his bed without bothering to ask. It makes it even harder to look at him, but you can’t bear to stand up anymore, not when your legs have felt on the brink of giving out since you got back. You drag a hand through your damp hair. “But, Christ, I thought you were _home_ , Steve. I didn’t even realize it was you at first.”  
  
Nothing for a few seconds. Steve looks like he wants to move forward, like it’s hurting him to stay in one spot. “I kind of figured,” he says. “But I didn’t wanna say anything, I didn’t want to ask why you wouldn’t—”

“Wish you did,” you say quietly, smile without any humor. “Would’ve saved us a lot of trouble.”  
  
Steve’s voice is quiet, cautious when he asks, “Bucky, what happened to you in there?”

Your blood turns to ice, throat filling with sick, and even though you swallow everything down, you must twitch, must turn even paler than you already are because Steve is coming closer, setting his huge hands on your shoulders. At least those are the same, maybe a little less slim, but his fingers are familiar, long and bony, pressing into your muscles. “Sorry, I’m sorry,” he says quickly, handling you like you’re a grenade. “Never mind, just forget I said anything.”  
  
You only shake your head, but you don’t shrug him off. You didn’t think you’d want to be touched, but you do, and you’re so grateful for it, grateful for the warmth of his skin seeping through your shirt. His hands were never this hot before, not unless he had a fever.

“It’s…” you bite on your cheek, wracking your brain for the right words to say. “You don’t need to know, but I’ll tell you it was nothing good. When you pulled me off that table, I...I didn’t know which way was up, didn’t know what the hell was going on. Didn’t even realize I was really and truly out of there till morning came.”

“Jesus, Bucky,” Steve breathes, and one hand moves up to your face. You remember, suddenly, that he did the same thing in Zola’s lab, but this time, it lingers. You feel the roughness of his thumb rasp against your stubble, and you lean into it, angle your head to look up at him. His face is mostly the same, maybe just a little more filled out, like he’s eating more, but thank God, it hasn’t changed. “I’m—”

“I don’t want you apologizing to me,” you mutter, fingers digging into your thigh. “Nothing you could have done.”  
  
“I just wish I got here sooner, that’s all,” Steve says, drops his other hand to your bicep. “Wish I could’ve got you outta there before it got bad.”  
  
You do, too, but you don’t tell him that.

“Quit beating yourself up about it,” you say, and you try to make it sound reassuring, but it’s just sharp. You’ve lost your grasp on how to be gentle a long time ago, and you wish you still knew how to do it. “Just, I dunno, just come sit with me for a while.”

It takes a moment, but he does. His knee bumps against yours. There are less restrictions to this now, and you aren’t really sure what _this_ is at all anymore, but you don’t care right now. Tomorrow’s another day, and maybe you two will make some time to talk about it.

“Hey,” you say, and he turns just as you slide your hand up the nape of his neck, pulling him close. You’re both heavy with exhaustion, throats tight with it. “You with me?”

“Yeah,” Steve starts, a little thin. You can feel his breath fan out against your face, and then his hands are on your hips, grip tight, like you might turn to smoke if he lets go. “Buck, everybody kept telling me you were as good as dead, and...at one point, I started to believe them.” He says it like an apology. You trace your thumb over the divot at the base of his skull, which is exactly as it was last time. One of the few things untouched by whatever the army did to him. 

“I didn’t know what I was gonna find when I got to Austria,” he continues. “But I knew I had to bring you home. It didn’t matter if you were dead, I wasn’t gonna leave you there. I wouldn’t have been able to live with myself if I did.”

You try not to look at him, to avoid the raw grief in his face, but you see it anyway, and your heart lurches when you see the tears fall. You haven’t seen him cry since his ma died. Even when he was a kid, he’d walk away from fights dry-eyed, no matter how injured he was.

“Steve, come on.” You squeeze his neck with one hand, use the other to wipe the wetness from his cheek, use your whole palm to do it before you slide your thumb over his cheekbone, the corner of his eye. “I’m here now, huh?” you mutter. “Still got all my fingers and toes. Still listening to you flapping your gums at me. We’re both _here_.”

He laughs wetly, and it’s the most miserable sound you’ve ever heard. His mouth is all twisted up, throat bobbing hard. It’s leaving you feeling worse off than before. You stared death in the face, and you haven’t seen Steve in a full year. You’re allowed to feel a little choked up.

“Ain’t our time yet, anyway,” you say, and then he’s clutching you so close you can barely breathe, all strong arms and a solid, too-big chest, but you hold on tight, focus on his breath ghosting over your skin, and inhale the smell of soap, of stiff cotton. “You’re stuck with me now, pal. Ain’t letting you out of my sight.”

You squeeze back tightly, and he makes a noise in the back of his throat as you do. Like he did when he was in the throes of a fever and felt the pressure of a cool towel on his forehead. _Relief_.

“God, I missed you,” Steve says against your shoulder. “I missed you so much, Buck, you got no idea.”

“Think I might,” you murmur. Steve’s hand comes to the back of your head and you shut your eyes, let the weariness weighing you down take over, let yourself lean into him for a little while, strange as it is. He’s so _warm_ , like he has a sun trapped inside of him, and for once, it doesn’t leave you sick with worry. “I really think I might.”

-

You don’t talk much after that, but you don’t make any moves to leave. You snatch a paperback of _Gone with the Wind_ that Steve definitely didn’t read, and then you blanch a little when you realize it’s _yours_. “I forgot I bought this,” you say from the desk. What the hell did Steve need a desk for if he was doing a stage show? Did he ask for one? You doubt it. “I can’t tell you why I did. I hated that damn movie.”  
  
“We were in there for an hour and you were asleep for most of it,” Steve says from the bed, but doesn’t disagree. You remember him elbowing you hard in the ribs and being shushed when you cursed a blue streak during some important scene since Steve’s elbows were like _knives_. “Left me suffering through it.”

“Yeah, well, lemme see if the book is any better,” you say, and drag the hard-backed chair closer to the bed, pull your boots off, and prop your feet up beside Steve’s. He has the leather notebook you gave him forever ago, and your chest twinges, because he was just...carrying bits of you around, keeping you close. Same like you did with his letters.

All you can hear is the familiar scritch of a pencil, the flip of a page as you burn through the first chapter of the book. Rain starts pattering on the roof at some point, growing increasingly heavier. Steve’s foot brushes yours, and you bump him back for it.

You think you could stay in this tent for the rest of your life.

-

“You don’t have to go, y’know,” Steve says, but you’re already shoving your feet into your boots. He looks like he’s holding himself back again, and you’ve really never noticed that he does it. Not until now. Did he always? Did he have to choke what he felt down as hard as you did? “We can figure something out.”

You shake your head. “Can’t sleep here,” you say, and stand up, already feeling antsy. “Gotta stay in the barracks with the other grunts. Unless you got a spare bed.”  
  
“Would we need one?” Steve asks, mouth perking up ever so slightly.  
  
“Well, considering the fact that you’re not one hundred pounds soaking wet anymore, yeah, I’d say we would,” you say, point at him with the book in your hand as you step away. “I wanna know that story, by the way. I leave you in Brooklyn looking like a stick and now you show up looking like Flash Gordon? Makes no sense, if you ask me.”  
  
“I do _not_ look like Flash Gordon,” Steve says, smiling for real now.

“You absolutely fucking _do_ ,” you say. 

You’re about to duck out when you hear, “Buck?” and you turn around. Steve is still in the same spot, still looking at you like he’s not quite sure you’re real. You think you can understand that. He sticks his hands deep in his pockets. “I’ll be awake for a while, so if you need to come back...”  
  
You know what he means. He’s always phrased things in a way so they don’t sound mushy. You know why he does it. He hates being coddled, and so do you. What he means is, _if you wake up screaming, you’re welcome to stay with me_.  
  
You plaster something like a smile on your mouth, warmth trickling into your veins. “Night, Steve,” you say, and jog for the barracks, relieved to feel rain on your skin, to taste the dampness in the air.

-

You don’t get much rest, but you feel just fine, thank you very much, and managing to catch a couple of hours of uninterrupted sleep is a goddamn _miracle_ since you thought your dreams would be a mess. They will be soon, though, you’re sure of that. 

Right now, your body is so exhausted, head so full to the brim it doesn’t have time to show you anything. You doubt you’ll be shaken by any of it, since everything you’ve seen in the real world has been much, much worse.

-

Word comes that you’re headed to London, and the news makes rounds around the camp. The air is lighter, easier around everyone, and soon enough, there’s a gaggle of you at the train station, boarding and filing into seats. You think you see a glimpse of Steve, but he’s whisked off somewhere with Agent Carter, probably into a first class cabin, so you get on with everyone else, trying to wrap your head around whatever’s going on there, if anything is going on at all.

-

“You’ve gotta be kidding,” Dugan says as he deals another hand of blackjack. You don’t know where everyone else has gone, but for right now, it’s just the two of you. You don’t mind that so much. “No way is that the same guy.”

“Buddy, I’m just as shocked as you are,” you say, since that’s all you can do. You’ll squeeze an answer out of Steve soon enough. “When I left, he just about came up to my shoulder, and now he shows up breaking shit and looking like—look, I dunno what the hell they paid him, but Steve would sooner clean the goddamn latrines with a _toothbrush_ than get up on a stage.”

Dugan shrugs. “He made it here, didn’t he?” he says, eyes on his cards. “Wasn’t that his plan?”

“Guess I underestimated how stubborn he really is,” you say, and flick your eyes down to your cards with a disgusted sound. You grimace. _15_. “Just hit me. I’m gonna bust, anyway.”  
  
Dugan lays down another card. 6. “Well, I’ll be damned,” he says. “You’re not hustling me, are you, Barnes?”  
  
“Blackjack’s chance, Dum Dum,” you say. “If I wanted to hustle you, I woulda said poker.”

-

London has remarkably clear skies, but it’s worse off than it was last time.

It’s hard to look at the wreckage directly, to think about the air raids. You’ve only heard stories about them in pubs, never seen one for yourself.

You’re a little confused when you’re about to board the trolley and an officer you’ve only spoken to once or twice says the cab he’s just flagged down is for you, says the tab will be taken care of. You sit in the backseat silently as you pass a few taverns, pass cheaper hotels, and then you’re even more confused when you reach the goddamn _Savoy Hotel_.

You walk through the doors, and feel ridiculously out of place; even with the other soldiers milling around, checking into their rooms on the army’s dime. Word is you have four days of R&R, but you’ll be in London for a week in total, meaning the brass has good reason for shipping everyone here.

It’s after you get your room key, after you get into the elevator that someone shouts _hold the door!_ before she slips inside, and it’s then that you realize you’ve never seen Agent Carter up close, only in passing up until right now.

“Where are you headed?” you ask, pressing the button to get to the sixth floor.  
  
Carter pushes past you, jabs her knuckle onto the gold embossed _8_ instead of answering. She leans back against the wall, shoves a stray curl from her face. “I don’t mean to be rude,” she says, voice smooth against your ears. “Just in a bit of a rush, is all.”  
  
You raise your hands at her as the elevator begins its trek up. “No worries, ma’am,” you say. “Just don’t often see a lady shove me like that unless I did something real awful to her.”  
  
“I think you’re too polite to be a cad, Sergeant Barnes,” Carter says with a tilt of her head. You knit your brows together, and she seems to know what you’re thinking. “Yes, I know who you are. Did a bit of reading on you, after our mutual friend jumped from a plane to rescue you.”  
  
 _That_ gets your attention, alright. “Jumped from a—” you huff, scrub your hand over your mouth. Your stubble is turning to a beard now. Christ, you need a shave. “Pardon my french, Agent, but I’m gonna fucking kill him.”

Carter grins at you, then, a closed mouth thing. You’re shocked to see a spark of humor in her fatigue-ringed eyes. “Steve has a habit of giving heart attacks, I see,” Carter says. _Steve_ , not Rogers. That gets the cogs in your head turning again. “I thought about the same when I watched him do it.”  
  
The elevator dings on the sixth floor. “I think he’d be believe you more than he would me,” you say, half-joking. Carter’s words definitely hold more weight than yours do. “You all right?”

Carter shrugs one shoulder. “Like I said, bit of a rush,” she says. “Get some rest, Sergeant. Colonel Phillips wants to speak to you in the morning.”  
  
You? Why you? 

“Yes, ma’am,” you say as the elevator doors close, and make your way down the hall.

You find your room, which is about the size of your old apartment, and wonder briefly where Steve is staying. You’re only in for about a minute, just putting your bag down and taking a quick look around before you walk right back out. There’s a pretty decent bar downstairs, and you’ll be damned if you don’t get a good glass of whiskey right here and now. God knows you need one.

-

_Dear Family,_

_Well, if you couldn’t tell by the swanky envelope and paper, I’m currently in London and staying in a hotel room that probably costs more than I make in a year. I’m sorry about the scare. and for going dark on you. I’m guessing you’ve seen the papers, but just know we’re all fine here. Cross my heart._

_I miss you both something awful. London’s pretty banged up, but I will say she’s quite the looker. I might try to send something nice since I’ll be here for a few days more, so don’t be surprised if you get an extra package._

_Ma, I’ve read your letters that I missed out on, and I don’t think any more apologizing will do it any good. All I can say is I’m going to be as consistent as I can be with getting back to you, since I’ve missed it more than I imagined I would._

_Becca, you’ve been surprisingly quiet. What’s going on with you, pal? Get in touch and let me know you’re doing ali right, and if married life is all it’s cracked up to be. If not, I am more than willing to come back home and punch a little freckled face in._

_If you can, send me some pictures. I hope to do the same if I can get my hands on a camera._

_Sending my love,_

_Sgt. J.B. Barnes_

_P.S. Steve says he sends his love too, since he’s an a— kisser._

-

“Good morning, Sergeant,” a kid says at your door the next morning, 7 AM on the dot. “Colonel Phillips wants to see you.”

“I know that, slick,” you say irritably, still groggy as all hell. You’ve been up for hours, half dressed, and your voice still sounds like you’ve only just woken up. “Give a guy a second, and we’ll get going.”

You put on the rest of your uniform, comb your hair back before you pocket your room key and step out. “Lead the way.”  
  
-

“The famous Sergeant Barnes,” Phillips says when you step into his makeshift office. “I feel like I should ask for your autograph, considering how big of a stink Captain Rogers made about you.”

 _Captain Rogers_. Did they promote him already? You’d ask, but—  
  
“Well, sir, I’m sorry to say I don’t have the star power to give you one,” you say, and sit down in the chair opposite him. His desk is fanned out with papers, and he’s barely looking up from them now.  
  
“I’d agree with you on that, but your track record is telling me otherwise,” Phillips says. “Drafted in October 1940, top of your class at Fort McCoy, six months in Greenland, promoted to Sergeant before you even got to Guadalcanal. Excellent marksman, too. Over one hundred and twenty confirmed kills.”

That makes your blood run cold. Sometimes, you forget it’s not just a number. “That’s correct,” you say, pause before you continue. “You mind if I ask what this is about, Colonel?”  
  
“I thought you would right off the bat,” Phillips says, and pulls on a pair of reading glasses. “I’m offering you an ultimatum, Barnes.”

He doesn’t leave you room to say anything, because he continues from there. “Rogers’ showgirl days are long gone, and as it turns out, he really might be better suited as a symbol on the front instead of a stage. We both agree it’s better he doesn’t do that alone. That he has something of a strike team behind him, of a few men he hand-picked himself. It’s all a little ragtag, if you ask me, but it might interest you.”  
  
“It doesn’t sound like such a bad idea,” you say. At least Steve wouldn’t be alone, and from what it sounds like, you might be able to be on his six, keep him from getting his head blown off.

“So, far he’s chosen Gabriel Jones, James Morita, James Montgomery Falsworth,” Phillips reads, and you’re surprised enough by those names as he lays their files in front of you. “Jacques Dernier, and Timothy Dugan. See what I mean by ragtag?” He stands up, produces one more slip of paper. “Yours was the first name he mentioned, but he said he wanted to give you time to sleep on it, mainly because of this.”  
  
Phillips puts the paper down over the files, and your jaw almost drops.

A certificate, for honorable discharge.

It already has your name on it and everything, it just hasn’t been signed.

“You’ve been serving for almost four years, son,” Phillips says. “You’ve done your part, but it looks like the choice is yours if you want to continue doing that.”

You could go home. Christ, you could go home and yet—

_Yet._

You pull your mouth into a tight line, hands clasped in your lap. You try your damnedest not to wring them. If Steve wasn’t here, if he stood home like you fucking _said_ , you’d say no. You’d say no in a heartbeat, get your medal, and run for the hills.

But now, Steve is here. Steve is here, almost a foot taller than he was a year ago, and he saved your life. Pulled you right off the chopping block. He was right, as angry as he was that night in the woods—if he hadn’t shown up, you’d still be in Kreischberg, probably dead, tossed into the incinerator with all of Zola’s other failed subjects.

“This is...” You try to think of the words, eyes on the certificate. “It’s an incredible offer, but I think it would be wrong of me to leave now. I’ll take a place on his strike team.”

“And you’re sure of that?”  
  
You nod once. “As sure as I can be.”  
  
Phillips looks at you over his glasses for a long moment, and then he reaches, puts the certificate away. You wish you felt more regret. You wish you wanted to say yes, but how could you leave Steve to run into battle? “I guess I’ll say I had a feeling you’d say yes,” he says. “And I guess I’ll be the one to say Rogers could use a man like you at his back.”  
  
It’s hard not to laugh, so you do. “Sir,” you say. “I’ve been watching his back for almost twenty years. I don’t think it’ll be too much trouble for me to do it again.”

-

The first person to find you afterward is Falsworth, and according to him, everyone is headed to a pub to celebrate the fact that you’re all bosom buddies now. It’s some hole in the wall near the hotel, and an old, out of tune piano is playing.

You find Steve and everyone else at a table in the back. The rest of the pub has already gotten halfway drunk. When you get in, Dugan shouts, “There he is! The man of the hour!”  
  
“And what am I, then? A next-door neighbor?” Falsworth says, settles into a seat with a pint waiting.  
  
“Don’t get so cut up about it, huh, Monty?” Jones calls. He takes a drink from his beer, and you think you could use one, too.

“Say, Jones,” you say, plop into the chair on Steve’s left, loosen your tie. At your spot, there’s a glass of whiskey waiting, and God, are you relieved for that. The stuff here is good, even though you’re not feeling the buzz you want lately. “You gettin’ used to warm beer already?”  
  
“Hell no,” Jones chuckles. “I’d give an arm and a leg for it to be cold.”  
  
“You can say that again,” you say, you turn to Steve, who looks surprised and grateful that you’re here at all. “Well, look at you, Flash.”

Steve rolls his eyes, shuts them. “Bucky, I swear to God.”

You can’t be blamed for looking. He cleans up nice in his uniform. Real nice.  
  
“Doesn’t he look like Flash Gordon?” you ask, maybe too loudly. “Jim, doesn’t he?”

Morita gives Steve a look, and then laughs. “Jesus Christ, you’re right,” he says. “Spitting image!”

“Ha!” you say triumphantly, and smack Steve on the arm. “What did I fucking say?”

-

Evidently, you were the first to say yes to Steve’s offer, because everyone else turns out to say they’re in right then and there.

The noise gets to be a little much as the night goes on, so you slip away from the table for a little while. Nurse your fourth glass of whiskey at the bar, aware of the mess you must look, even though you feel fine. Your head is mostly screwed on straight, limbs working the way you want them to, but you should be drunk by now. Very drunk, as a matter of fact.

It makes you feel tense and cold all over, but you don’t have time to give it much thought because Steve is coming over, sliding onto the stool beside you. “I told you,” you say, hoping you sound vaguely like your old self. “They’re all idiots.”  
  
-

You talk, and feel some more of the ice between you chip away, but then Agent Carter of all people, shows up. Shows up in a knockout of a red dress and makes a beeline for Steve while you watch, and they’re so wrapped up in each other that they barely notice you, barely hear you when you try to cut in. 

Something ugly and possessive crawls up from your gut, clenches tight around your heart and refuses to let go.

It’s selfish of you to think that you saw him first, but the truth is that you _did_. No one saw anything worthwhile in Steve, no one but you, and you loved him until it drove you up the wall.

Steve, whose heart was always too big for his body, now has a body that fits him just fine. Now, everyone sees what you’ve always seen, what was always underneath the bruised skin and aching bones of him, and he’s one step away from not being yours anymore.

-

Seven drinks in, and you’re not even the slightest bit tipsy. The bartender looks at you funny when you come for an eighth, so you tell him to forget it, and pay your tab. It’s last call, anyway.

When you dip out for a smoke, the air is wet and biting. Everyone is making their way to leave, but you hang back, slip into the shadows since you’re not so up for company. The last to leave is Steve, and Agent Carter walks out with him, wrapped in a long black coat that brushes her ankles. Your throat dries out as you watch them talk, and you can hear it pretty well, but you try to tune it out, feeling like you’re intruding.

They don’t kiss. They don’t do _anything_. Steve just walks her to her car across the street, and sees her off as she drives away.

You hate yourself for it, but you’re relieved.

“So,” you drawl as Steve crosses the street back toward the pub. You take a final drag of your smoke before you toss it into the road. “You and Agent Carter, huh?”

Steve clams up at that, hands in his pockets. He looks like he’s still not quite used to his body. How could he be? You think you’d go crazy from a change like that. “It’s not like that,” he says with a shake his head. “It’s really not.”  
  
“And why’s that?” you ask. You shove off the wall, take a step closer. “She’s a hell of a woman, Steve.”

Steve huffs. “Yeah, I know, that’s the thing,” he says. “I think she’s out of my league.”

“She doesn’t seem to think so,” you say. “I saw how she looks at you, how her face gets when you come up in conversation.”  
  
“You two talking about me behind my back?” he asks, tries to smile at you, but seems to give up halfway through, massive shoulders sagging. “Buck, it’s not like —”  
  
You don’t want to hear the end of that sentence. You don’t know why. You shake your head. “I ain’t expecting anything from you, if that’s what you’re getting at,” you say, shrugging. “Like I said, Carter’s a hell of a woman. Only an idiot would pass on someone like her, so I hope you’ve got some sense in you.”  
  
Neither of you say a word. Once again, there’s something that feels impenetrable growing between you. You already know you’re the one making it worse, pushing Steve away, but for some reason you can’t seem to _stop_.

Maybe you don’t want him to see the ugliness taking root in your heart. Maybe you don’t want him to know you’re not you anymore. Not really. Whatever Zola did, whatever he injected you with, it’s like you’re rotting from the inside out, turning to something cold and unrecognizable. Something without remorse.

“I’m gonna head back, get some sleep,” you say, and turn around, head in the direction of The Savoy. “Don’t wait up.”  
  
You’re gone before Steve can say a word, back in the lobby faster than you imagined you would be.

-

In your room, you finally shave. The wooden handle of your straight razor feels like the grip of a rifle, and because of that, your hands don’t shake at all. Your face is clean soon enough, and you only nick yourself once, but it heals up quick, so it doesn’t bother you.

You take a bath that’s just this side of scalding, but it feels incredible. It melts away knots you didn’t even know you had, knots that the whiskey refused to loosen. You feel like you didn’t get clean enough in Azzano, didn’t get the rain and the muck off of you. It felt like it made its way inside of you, got caught in your bones and your insides.

God, if you could flush all the carnage, all the filth right out of your veins and replace it with fresh, clean blood. you would. You’d do it in a heartbeat.  
  
You get out and dry off, change into your skivvies, not bothering with pajamas. Who the hell is here to look anyway?

Maybe should eat something. Take advantage of the twenty-four hour room service, since you’re fucking _ravenous_ now that you think about it. After your meeting with Phillips, you cleared through two full Englishes in the restaurant downstairs, and still had room for more, but didn’t have any time to eat. You were never like this, or, maybe you were, but you were just used to not eating often. 

With your back-breaking shifts, with money being so tight, eating was more of a necessity than a luxury. It’s still a necessity, of course it is, but can’t you enjoy it for a couple of days? Put something other than your rations or the slop from a mess hall into your mouth? 

Say, maybe you’ll order a steak. An expensive one, too. Order it rare and a little bloody with roasted potatoes. Or maybe a—

Someone is knocking at the door.

You cross the room barefooted, feel plush carpet under your toes. You really couldn’t care less about who sees you like this right now. It sends a pretty clear message to take a hike, anyway.

When you open the door, Steve is standing on the other side, just wearing a t-shirt and his uniform pants. When you look down, you see he’s only wearing socks.

“You run through this place half-dressed?” you ask. He looks pissed, but you don’t lay off. “That must have been one hell of a show.”  
  
“My room’s across the hall,” Steve says stiffly. “Just let me in, Bucky.”  
  
“I ain’t got any frogskins if that’s what you’re looking for,” you say, even though that’s not technically an answer. “Maybe one of the other GIs have some—”

“God, would you shut up already?” Steve snaps.

It cuts you to the core, catches you off-guard, but for whatever reason, you move aside and let him in. 

Anyone else would have shut the door on him, but you know Steve. You know he’ll just just keep persisting until you let him in, and you doubt anyone needs to see a half-dressed Captain America cursing up a storm in the hallway.

“I don’t understand what’s going on here,” Steve says the second you shut the door, already pacing around the room. He drags a hand through his hair, stopping in his tracks, face screwed up into a grimace. “You’re so _pissed_ at me. All the goddamn time, and I’ve got no clue how to fix it because the second I get near you, you peel out before I can even try to catch up with you. I thought we were getting somewhere at the base camp, but it’s like—it’s like you’re _running_ from me. You’re running from me, and you won’t even tell me why.”

He’s breathing heavily, like it all exploded out of him without his say-so. Maybe it did.

“I’m not stupid, you know. I know you’re…” he stalls, presses his mouth into a tight line. You grit your teeth, lean back against the door. “I know you’re hurting. I know it, and I’m sorry, I really am. I don’t want to make things any worse for you. I want to help you, but I can’t do that if you keep shutting me out. You just gotta give me an answer, you gotta tell me if you still want me to stick around.”  
  
“If I didn’t want to be around you, I wouldn’t have said yes to Phillips,” you say. “I would have took my discharge and went home.”

“Then what’s going on?” Steve asks, quieter this time. His hands are at his hips, fingers visibly digging into his own skin. “You know you can tell me. Whatever it is.”

That’s the thing, you don’t know what it is.

Your lack of an answer seems to be worse than saying anything at all. Steve opens his mouth, closes it again.

You lick your lips, still tasting of toothpaste. “I don’t know what you want me to say—”

“Do you regret it?” Steve asks, point blank. “If you do, you gotta tell me, because I—” he runs a hand over his face, eyes burning into yours. “I’ll drop it. If that’s what you want me to do. We’ll put a pin in it for good this time.”

It almost makes your knees give out beneath you. Your voice is fizzling away at the tip of your tongue, even though you want now, more than anything, to say something. You swallow hard, trying to find your words, to fix this before it crashes down because of your own cowardice. Your own inability to deal with this head-on, after everything.

“Steve.” Your voice is weak, thin, but you force yourself to continue. You can feel the wetness of your hair dripping down your nape, soaking through the back of your t-shirt. “Steve, pal, that’s not what it is. You gotta know that.”  
  
“Yeah, well, I don’t,” Steve says, then sighs. “You’re puttin’ up all of these walls and I...I don’t know how to break them down. I don’t even know if you want me to break them down.”

You shut your eyes, just for a few seconds. You think Steve says your name again, but you can’t be sure. “I thought,” you start, shake your head. “It doesn’t matter. Just drop it.”

“Like hell I’m gonna drop it,” Steve says firmly. His eyes are alight with anger, with something that might be hurt. “Just spit it out, Buck. I can handle it.”

You breathe out, and it’s sharp and rough in your throat. “Fuck. I thought you were...” you clench your fists at your sides before you throw your arms in the air. “I dunno, alright? It’s been over a year since we did what we did, and I saw the way you were looking at Carter in the fucking pub, and at the _base_ , and—Christ, Steve, how the hell was I supposed to get in the way? I saw you getting a shot at something normal so I backed off!”  
  
“Is anything about this normal?” Steve argues, meets you halfway when you move closer. “Does any of this make any sense? I get dumped into a machine and come out like _this_ , there’s a whole extra set of goddamn Nazis now, and I’m leading you and everyone else into the line of fire to get rid of them. What the hell is normal about our lives, anyway?”

His chest is rising and falling quickly, but he steels himself after a moment. You keep expecting a wheeze in his breath, but you haven’t heard one since he showed up. 

“Peggy’s good people. She’s one of the toughest people I’ve ever met, and I think we get along just fine, but she’s not you.” Steve is reaching for your wrist. His hot fingers curling around it, expression raw and completely cracked open. “No one’s ever gonna be you, Buck. No one.”  
  
You feel like you’re going crazy. You don’t know whether to smile or laugh or be angry or cry all over him, let relief wash over you, let yourself be comforted with the thought that he still wants this.

That he still wants you, mess in your head and all.

It all seems to happen at once, and for a second, all you can do is look at him. Your vision blurs for a second, turns Steve to a big blond smudge before the world clears.

“Yeah,” you say, low enough that he won’t hear your voice catch, You’re not looking at him directly. You’re flicking your gaze over his brow, his chin, the bump of his nose bridge. “Yeah, you’re it for me, too. Couldn’t shake you off if I tried.”  
  
“Did you ever? Try, I mean.” Steve asks, even closer now. Until now, you haven’t seen him in anything but that costume or his dress uniform. You want to see more, and maybe you want to touch him, too, but you don’t think you’ll be able to get it up. You still feel out of sorts, still cringe at the thought of putting a hand on yourself even when you want to.

“Not as much as I wanted to,” you say, try and fail to smile at him. “If they weren’t blonde and skinny, they were spitfires, or artsy types or...you get the picture.”

“Guess I should take it as a compliment,” he says, and the air around you seems torn between growing thicker and allowing you both to breathe.

“Just one thing,” you say.

Steve nods, looking a little dazed. As dazed as you feel.

“I want to know what happened to you. From the beginning. I gotta wrap my head around it, Stevie. They didn’t—” You swallow thickly. You can’t even think about it. You bring your hands to either side of his face, like you can check him for damage. “You weren’t anywhere like I was, were you? You’re not hurt?”  
  
“No,” Steve insists, maybe too quickly, but that might just be paranoia. His face isn’t doing the thing it does when he’s lying. “No, it wasn’t like that, I swear. It was...I’ll tell you everything you want to know. Everything, Buck, I promise.”  
  
You nod a little, slow. He still has all the same old scars on his face. The miniscule, sunken one at his temple that he must have gotten before you ever met him. “Well,” you say softly. “Bed looks pretty comfortable, if you wanna sit there.”

-

It takes a while, but Steve does tell you everything, starting from the moment you separated at the Expo, to the moment Howard Stark _himself_ flew him into Kreischberg.

“Wait,” you say, hold a finger up. “So, Schmidt. He really did rip his own face off.”  
  
Steve’s face does something strange, shoulders rising up a little, but you aren’t sure what does it—the memory or the fact that you were so out of your head that you had no idea what was actually happening. “Yeah, that was real.”  
  
“Christ,” you groan, cover your face with your hands and lean back against the pillows—too soft. Like goddamn marshmallows. “I wish that was a fucking hallucination.”

“You and me both. I can’t stop thinking about it,” Steve says, spins his hand into a circle near his temple. “It’s just, over and over in my head. Can’t get it out.”

You wondered if he was getting nightmares. You wonder when they’ll get worse for him. More bloodshed, more carnage is coming. You can almost taste it. 

“Yeah,” you say quietly, hiking your knee up a little to rest it against his. “I know the feeling.”

-

Steve doesn’t stop there. He tells you everything the serum can do. Everything he knows of, at least. Accelerated speed, sight, healing, _hearing_. It’s like something out of a comic book.

“So, no more asthma,” you say, disbelieving.  
  
Steve says, “Nope.”  
  
“No more fevers.”  
  
“I run hot as it is now,” Steve says. “Even if I had one, I wouldn’t know.”  
  
“Or it’d just kill you, boil up your brain,” you add, not so helpfully, but it does break some of the heaviness, puts a slight smile on his face. “No more—God, is there anything bad about this?” you ask.  
  
“Yeah, actually,” Steve says, and turns to look at you, “Can’t get drunk.”  
  
You can’t deny the way your stomach flips over at that. 

“Get out of town,” you say instead. “That’s rough.”  
  
“I swear, Buck, I went through a whole bottle of scotch in Utah, and I didn’t feel a thing,” he says, but he’s not bragging about it. “Cells regenerate so fast I can’t even get a _buzz_ .”  
  
You’re half-tempted to bring up what happened to you tonight. How eight glasses of good, strong whiskey didn’t do anything to you at all, but you don’t think you’re ready to say it. You don’t want any more labcoats around you, any more needles. 

Steve already told you how much of his blood they took, about the tests that went on for days, and you didn’t tell him to stop because you needed to know how it happened. 

You need to know what they did to him, because maybe, just maybe, it’ll help you understand what Zola did to you.

-

“Jesus,” you say, take a drag from your cigarette. You never smoke on Steve unless you’re outside, but, well, you suppose it won’t hurt him now. That’s what he said, at least. He’s as healthy as a horse. “If Ma saw me right now, she’d kill me.”

Steve’s brows knit together. “Why would she do that?” he asks, and then grins when he sees what you mean: you sprawled on the bed with a lit cigarette. “Oh my God, yeah. Yeah, she would.”  
  
“‘Devel, Yasha, I swear you’re gonna set my _fucking house_ on fire one day,’” you say, and you’re surprised when a laugh punches its way out of you. “Hey, I got a confession, but if you tell her, you’re dead.”

“Buck, don’t tell me—”  
  
“Yeah, alright, I really almost set the place on fire,” you say with feigned irritation, wave him off. “I was, I dunno, thirteen? Stole one of her cigarettes and went back in my room. Didn’t knock the ashes off because I was an idiot, and burned a hole right through my sheets. Balled ‘em up and tossed ‘em in the dumpster at the crack of dawn before she saw.”

“So, when Winnie came in and saw your sheets were gone,” Steve starts.

“Told her I puked all over ‘em,” you finish, smash your smoke in the ashtray on the nightstand. “I think that’s one of the few times I actually lied to her, and maybe the only time she didn’t catch me.”  
  
“That’s awful,” Steve chuckles. “Jesus, I didn’t even know you started that young.”

“I may have been stupid, but I knew smoke wasn’t good for you. Saw Sarah always going out on the fire escape for one,” you say, and then you nudge him with your elbow. “Hey, did you see them much before you left? Ma and Rebecca? I never asked.”  
  
“I left about a week after you did, but, yeah, I did. The secret’s out now, but I told them the same thing I told you, I got a job doing propaganda,” Steve says. “They were alright, though. You know them. Tough as nails. I mainly just saw your ma, since Becca was running all over with Scott, trying to find a decent place to live. We all wrote each other as much as we could, but I think I was moving around so much, I was missing letters completely.”

“Letters here are a goddamn nightmare,” you say, puff out a slow breath and cross your arms. “You’ll get why I never wrote back sometimes. Either my head was too much of a mess or the mail got lost on its way to you.”

Without really realizing it, you lean against his shoulder, head dropping down against it. It’s not bony anymore, not digging into your neck like it usually would, but it’s easy to do this. Easy like breathing. 

You watch Steve’s hand come over your bare knee, watch his thumb trace over the mossy green bruise on your thigh. It doesn’t even hurt anymore. It’s just a dull pinch, but it grounds you. Reminds you that this is, in fact, real.

“You okay?” Steve asks, catches your gaze.

You realize you were holding your breath, and you let it out slowly. “Sure,” you say. “Peachy.”

You lift your head. Steve is so close, close enough for more than just sitting here, but you can’t bring yourself to do anything. Not yet. 

You don’t even know if Steve will let you, considering the way he keeps his distance, doesn’t seem to want to get undressed, get out of the army-issue trousers, even though you’ve seen him in less than that so many times, stripped to nothing but his shorts during sticky Brooklyn summers, or seen him in the bath, only water clouded with soap hiding whatever you weren’t supposed to see.

He doesn’t seem to believe the words falling for your lips. Only an idiot would, anyway. 

“What’s the game plan tomorrow?” you ask quietly.

“Briefing at eight o’clock sharp,” Steve says. “All of us, meaning we’re getting an idea of what they actually want us to do, so probably clearing the closest HYDRA base we can find, getting a better arsenal than we’re used to. You might meet Howard tomorrow, too.”  
  
“God.” You roll your eyes, press a hand over your chest. “If everyone at home could see me now, rubbing elbows with Captain America and Howard Stark. I’m an honorary star now.”  
  
“Hey, you should’ve been the one in Hollywood,” Steve says. “I always said it.”  
  
“Well, I thought you were joking around,” you say. “I didn’t think you actually thought I was that good-looking.”  
  
“I still ain’t giving you the satisfaction,” Steve shoots back, then chews on his lower lip. “My turn for a confession. I met Betty Grable in Los Angeles, and I got you her autograph. Got her to kiss the paper and everything.”  
  
You sit up a little further. Christ. Okay, all is forgiven. Maybe. “Yeah?” you press. “Well, where is it?”

Steve braces himself like you might hit him. “I might’ve lost it in Texas,” he says.

“Oh, you fucking stupid _dickhead!_ ” you say, and thump him in the head hard, sending his hair sticking up. He’s laughing, really laughing, muttering _ow fuck jesus bucky_. “That could’ve been the highlight of my life, and you ruined it because you were too busy packing your tights!”

-

The clock ticks on, but this time, you don’t have to leave. You don’t have to cross an ocean. Steve will only be across the hall.

“Maybe you should skedaddle,” you say, jerk your head toward the door. You’re tired. Good tired, though, not the heavy, mind-numbing fatigue you usually feel. “Don’t want anyone making assumptions.”  
  
Steve shakes his head. “Let ‘em make all the assumptions they like,” he says. “I’m stayin’ with you. You’re gonna have to kick me out if you really want me gone that bad.”  
  
“Tempting offer,” you tease, shrugging. “I need my beauty sleep, and you might stretch out and take up the whole bed, not leave me any room at all.”  
  
Steve gets off the bed, stripping out of his trousers, kicking them somewhere in the corner before lifting the sheet and blanket, getting underneath. “Not that much of an ass,” he says, and you shift, wiggle your own way under the covers. You barely slept last night, barely allowed yourself to enjoy the comfort of a bed you might never sleep in again unless you get filthy rich. “I’d give you a little bit of space.”

“Oh, that’s how it is,” you say, and you reach past him, clicking the light off, watching the faint light from the window play over his face instead. “Well, you seem a lot more comfortable than a mattress, pal, I gotta be honest. Turn around, huh?”  
  
Steve does. Turns his back to you, and you come up behind him, wrap one arm around his middle, get your arm under him and wrap it around his chest. You slip your leg between his, and pressed this close, he isn’t as big as you thought he was. 

Sure, it’s a big fucking change, but he’s just..taller. Has more meat on him. More muscle. He feels like anyone else would, it’s just not a feeling you would have ever associated with Steve, who you used to be able to gather right up in your arms if you really wanted to.

You can feel him let out a breath the same time as you do, shoulders relaxing against your chest. “Sorry,” you mumble. Steve’s hand comes up over yours, interlocks your fingers with his. It’s like you’re both afraid of floating away from each other, like you’re in the middle of the ocean, and keeping a hold of one another is all you can do. “Just wanna be close to you, that’s all.”

“Not complainin’,” Steve says after a beat. “Definitely not complainin’.”  
  
“You better not, ‘cause I ain’t movin’.” You rest your cheek against his, draw nonsense patterns into his hip. “You’re gonna have to pry me off with a damn crowbar.”  
  
You feel him laugh, more than you hear it. It vibrates right through you and maybe—

Maybe you’ll be able to sleep tonight after all.

“Quit running your mouth and shut your eyes, huh?” Steve says, and it’s already slower. Breathier. “We probably won’t have a lot of time for this for a long while.”  
  
“Don’t use your fuckin’ Cap voice on me, punk. You may be my CO now, but you ain’t my boss,” you say, but you do as he says anyway. Breathe him in. Still the same, just masked with the soap issued by the hotel, the thick smell of sweat and beer from the pub. “And don’t yap on me all night, huh? Lemme pretend I missed you for a while.”

Neither of you say anything for a while. You’re half aware of Steve’s fingers tracing over the back of your hand, the rise and fall of his breathing, the warmth of his body bleeding into yours. 

You aren’t sure when you fall asleep, but when your eyes open sometime after seven, Steve is still there.

-

You meet Howard Stark, and he gives Steve a giant goddamn frisbee, which is supposed to be painted red, white, and blue. Apparently, it’s supposed to give the Nazis something to talk about, something to fear, but it just sounds like a big ol’ target to you.

Stark gives you a modified Johnson rifle. It’s light and easy to carry, feels like a dream compared to the others you’ve used. “You gonna give her a name, sarge?” Howard asks after you’ve finished checking it out. “A gun that pretty deserves one.”  
  
You think of the autograph left in some hotel room, all Steve’s fault. You look directly at him when you grin and say, “She looks like a Betty, if you ask me.”

-

“Sergeant Barnes?” A concierge calls as you pass the front desk. 

You’re headed for the elevator, going to pack the few things you have, since you’re headed to Belgium in less than two days, but you stop in your tracks. “That’s what they call me,” you say, step closer.  
  
“Mail for you,” she says, and passes you two envelopes just before the phone rings, and she stops paying attention to you completely.

You must give her some kind of thanks, but then you’re walking away, heading to the restaurant nearby. You spot Steve in the lobby and smack him on the shoulder, guide him with you.

You read them after you sit down, starting with your mother’s. The letter starts with ‘Yasha’, and that makes your head swim. Just a little. Makes your chest twinge. You wish you could afford a phone call, wish you could call and hear everyone’s voices, but that would take forever to arrange, anyway.

Everything’s all right at home, she says not to send anything, says not to disappear like that again, not to throw yourself in the line of fire or she’ll come and drag you back to Brooklyn herself. You believe her.

Rebecca’s letter is next. You read it over a gulp of coffee, relieved to see her handwriting again—something close to cursive, but too sloppy to really call it that—and then choke the second your eyes skate over the next paragraph. 

“Bucky?” Steve asks frantically. “What is it?”

You shake your head, wave him off before you hack into your arm. Jesus, Jesus, _Jesus_ , you can barely read the rest. “Well, I’ll be damned,” you say, and beam at him. “I’m gonna be an uncle!”

“What? Give me that.” Steve reaches and snatches the letter from you, eyes scanning over it. “Oh my God,” he says, gaze snapping back up at you, eyes wide, a thrilled smile creeping up his mouth. “You’re gonna be an uncle!”

“Christ,” you say, and yeah, you’re a little misty about it, why wouldn’t you be? Your baby sister is having a baby of her own. “If she doesn’t name it after me, I’m disowning her.”

-

It takes a boat, and then a train, and finally a Jeep to get to the precise location Agent Carter wanted you all to be. It’s pouring buckets of rain by the time you get to the safehouse, the sun long since set, and there’s a soldier waiting with a rifle in his hand, there’s some code word he wants, and evidently Steve is the only one who knows it, because the second he says it, the seven of you are allowed inside.  
  
“I hope you’ve had an easy time getting here,” Carter says instead of hello, and now that you know where everyone stands, you’re able to look at her a little easier. Her hair is pulled in a tight bun, her face not done up like it usually is. She looks like she’s ready for an op of her own, considering how she’s dressed —sturdy trousers and boots, a heavy sweater and jacket, all neutral tones, almost all blacks and browns. “I wouldn’t take the time to sit down, though, since your first target is about a mile away from here. No one of importance inside, but there’s quite a lot of information we’d like to get our hands on.”  
  
She lays a blueprint on the table. It’s a good sized building, far from a stronghold, but it looks big enough. As she continues, she lays out the plan. Dernier goes in first to lay down explosives. You’re supposed to get in next, perch somewhere up high and concealed while Monty and Dugan go in guns blazing, followed by Morita at another entrance. You’ll take out anyone who comes at them, pick off as many HYDRA grunts as you can, and then Steve, dressed in a modified version of his Cap suit—durable, weather resistant, something that will actually protect him—is to be their big, star-spangled diversion while Carter and Falsworth gets their hands on the files.

You’re pretty surprised that she’s coming at all, but Carter is as tough as any of you, and you think you could use someone like her in this, simple as the op is.

Take down the targets. Get the hell out. Blow the place to bits. Piece of cake.

-

It’s a success. A big, booming success.

The eight of you watch the place burn, and after a few minutes, you turn to Carter.

“Agent,” you say, still holding onto your rifle too tightly. “I don’t know if anyone’s ever told you this, but you’re one hell of a woman.”

“I’ve only heard it from someone before they offered me a drink,” Carter says, and maybe you’re a little high on the win, on destroying the base, but you laugh at that, loud with your head tossed back. There’s a glint in her eye when she smiles at you. She’s a little smudged up with soot, same as everyone else. “But I’ll take the compliment.”  
  
“I gotta say, Peg,” Steve says from the other side of her. “We might get a lot more done with you on our team.”  
  
You’re able to stomach them talking to each other now, now that you know what’s going on in Steve’s head. The jealous thing growling in your chest has finally quieted down, and now that it has, you’re beginning to see why Carter managed to get her way to the top.

“ _Might_?” Dugan says. “Carter’s a better leader than you, Cap. So, if you want to hang up your shield—”  
  
“As enticing as that sounds,” Carter says, wipes the soot from her nose. “I do have a boat to catch. It’s not just the lot of you taking care of business, you know. Tell me you have a cigarette to spare, Sergeant.”  
  
“That I do, ma’am,” you say, and pull your pack, your matches from your inside pocket. You light her up, and then do the same for yourself. 

“You’re heading out already?” Steve asks.  
  
“Duty calls, I suppose,” Carter says through a flume of smoke, then nods at all of you. “I suppose I’ll see you in Luxembourg. Gentlemen.”  
  
Just like that, she’s gone, making her way through the cover of her woods before anyone can say anything else.

-

“You _like_ her,” you say when you get back to the bunker, strip your jacket off. “I _knew_ you liked her.”

“For God’s sake, Buck, leave it alone already,” Steve groans. Everyone’s gone to find a room, and since everyone else is bunking together, you take it as an opportunity to get to Steve. “I told you nothing’s going on.”  
  
“Hey, hey, I know that, I ain’t jealous anymore,” you say, raise your hands. “And now that I’m not, I’ll say that she’s a fucking knockout.”  
  
“ _You_ think she’s a knockout?” Steve says, chuckles. “I thought you’d be intimidated.”

“Who said I’m not?” you say, and come a little closer. “I grew up around a bunch of hard-headed gals, just never met one with a gun before.”  
  
“And she’s not afraid to use it, either, I’ll tell you that,” Steve says. You can practically hear his heart pounding in time with your own the closer you get. There’s a lock on the door and your head is racing, adrenaline leaving your body sparking like a live wire.

“Forget about that for a second,” you say, shaking your head. You’re tugging him closer by the straps for his shield. “We’re gonna be rollin’ around in the fucking mud these next few weeks, roughing it in the woods, and I’m thinking we need to take advantage of this.”  
  
You haven’t even kissed yet. You haven’t kissed him or put a hand on him since before you shipped out, and maybe you wish you did this in less of a rush, but seeing Steve now, streaked with dirt, sweaty, hair messed up, riding on the thrill of a fight, is doing something wicked to you, and you’d be a fool not to give into it.  
  
“Yeah?” Steve asks, quieter, this time, a glint in his eyes. “You got something in mind?”  
  
“Oh, _sweetheart_ ,” you drawl, and you shove past any lingering apprehension to slide your hand between his legs, rub your palm there and Christ, he’s already hard. A shiver runs up your spine, something wild blooming in your blood. Steve’s slick expression falters at the endearment, and you’re suddenly aching, needing more. You gotta call him that more often, test some other names on him, too, just to see how he reacts. “I got plenty in mind.”

-

It doesn’t take long to get undressed, to see the full extent of what Steve looks like now, and it’s a goddamn _sight_ , is what it is.

“Well, look at you,” you murmur, after he’s finally down to his shorts. You tug him closer by the hips, fit yours against him as you back him against the wall. It’s surreal being at eye level, and in some ways, it’s amazing, but a part of you still wishes to feel the bumps of his spine, to pull his legs around your waist, pin him between yourself and the wall, but God, this is good, too. This is incredible. “I swear, you look like something out of a pinup.”  
  
“What kinda pinups are you looking at, huh?” Steve shoots back, hands sliding your up chest. You’ve gained some weight back in London, gained some of your muscle again, so you don’t feel like there’s such a big difference between the two of you anymore.  
  
“Never you mind,” you tell him, feeling tightened up with anticipation when you rock your hips against his. “Say, did anything else get bigger?”  
  
That makes him sputter out a laugh, and then he goes cherry red. “You would think so,” he says. “I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t a little disappointed.”  
  
“Nah, don’t be,” you say, lean in close enough that his nose bumps against yours. “Mighta been the one part of you that wasn’t little.”

“Aw, Buck, you have such a way with words,” Steve deadpans, fingers threading into your hair. “A modern-day Shakespeare.”

“That’s what they call me,” you mutter, brush your mouth over Steve’s, taste his breath, shaky against your lips before you finally kiss him, hard and maybe a little bruising, a little too dirty. He chases you like water in a desert, though, tightens his fingers in your hair in a way that makes your head swim. You let yourself moan into his mouth, slide your hand under the waistband of his shorts to grab two handfuls of his ass. You break away, just for a moment. “Now get on the damn bed before I carry you there myself.”  
  
“Yeah, I’d like to see you try,” Steve quips, but then you’re both moving toward the bed closest to the wall. “How do you wanna do this, huh?”  
  
“Same as last time,” you say, and then pause, something dark and boiling rushing into your gut. “But I want you to do it to me.”  
  
You think you can feel him shiver when the words leave your lips. “Christ,” Steve breathes out, nods. “Yeah. Yeah, okay.”

“Okay,” you echo, and pull away to tug your shorts down. You think there’s a tin of Vaseline somewhere in your bag. “Then, what are we waiting for?”

-

You feel like you’ve been set on fire from the inside out, and maybe to anyone else that wouldn’t sound so nice, but the heat simmering inside of you, the race of your heart feels goddamn _incredible_.

You let Steve lie you back on the bed with your legs over the edge so he can lift them up, and you clench tight when he drapes them over his left shoulder, slotting himself between your thighs and dipping his head forward when he begins to move his hips.  
  
“Fuck,” you breathe out, head dipping back, something hungry clawing up your chest when his dick drags against yours. “I don’t know how I went this long without getting any. Don’t tell me—don’t tell me you just sat around like a goon, Stevie. Tell me you made it with one of those dancers.”  
  
“You really wanna know?” Steve asks. He looks gorgeous like this, flushed from his cheeks to his stomach, hair falling in his eyes. His skin is hot against yours, the length of him, slick with pre-come, is sending waves of want up your spine, curling tight in your lower back. You’ve missed this—not even him, just the feeling of being with someone, being touched or looked at in a way that made your blood sing.

“Tell me,” you say, bite down on your lip to keep from making a sound. Thank Christ the bed is sturdy, isn’t creaking with every move Steve makes. You’re leaking against your stomach, dangerously close to slipping over the edge. “Did you?”

Steve is close, too, and you take yourself in your hand while you watch him, watch the way his movements grow jerky, his knees buckling a little. “Yeah,” he huffs, and maybe that shouldn’t send a wave of want through you, but it _does_ , and the sound that breaks its way out of you is wounded as you stroke yourself faster, harder than before, eyes pricking and hot with it. “Yeah, I did, Buck, but all I could think was how bad I wanted it to be you. Only way I was able to—”  
  
That’s it. You’re finished, you’re fucking finished. Your breath is a sob when you come over your fist, back arching with it, eyes squeezing shut. When you feel the hot spill of Steve’s release between your thighs, dripping against your hip, you force your eyes open, blink the bleariness away to watch him ride it out. 

When you squeeze your legs tighter around him, move them against him, he shudders, one hand twisted in the sheets, the other gripping your ankle like a lifeline. “Yeah, look at you,” you breathe, heart still racketing against your ribs. You feel like there’s a new rush of vigor inside of you rather than your body coming down, like the excitement you felt at the edge of that hill, watching the compound blow to smithereens. “That’s what you needed.”

There’s no answer aside from Steve’s lips pressing to your calf, and it’s so shockingly intimate, it makes your head spin a little. “Get down here,” you say, finding his wrist with floppy fingers. He sets your legs down and you back further up on the bed. “Lemme look at you.”

When he crawls over you, you get a handful of his hair and tug him down into a kiss that makes you feel actually, properly intoxicated. Sure, you’ve gotten off when you’ve had to, just to keep your head straight, but it didn’t feel like this. Your head is clearer than before, eyes open and awake.

Steve’s head settles on your chest when it breaks, and you look down at him as he looks up, lashes dark, color high in his cheeks like a fever. You flop one leg over his back, a half-hearted attempt to keep him in place. “Next time,” you murmur, scratch lightly against his scalp. “Next time, I’m gonna get my dick in you.”  
  
Steve looks as breathless as you feel, and he shuts his eyes, laughs quietly, forehead resting against your collarbone. “Is that a threat or a promise?” he asks into your skin, traces his fingers over your side, stained with come. You aren’t sure whose it is. You don’t really care either way.

“Call it whatever you want, but it’s gonna happen eventually,” you say. “Now get up here and kiss me again, you dope.”

Steve raises himself up on his elbows. “I think I liked ‘sweetheart’ better,” he murmurs before he kisses you, slower and easier than before, in a way that’s turning your muscles to mush for the first time in...God, maybe ever. Where the hell did he learn to kiss like that?

You raise your eyebrows. “That so?” you ask against his lips. “You like bein’ sweet-talked, huh, Rogers?”

“I dunno,” Steve says. He lets you turn him over, chest flushed and heaving. He’s still a full-body blusher. That hasn’t changed. You didn’t get long with him the first time, but that was one of the things that stuck with you. “Guess you gotta test it out on me.”  
  
“Guess so, sugar,” you say. Grin when he rolls his eyes at you. You have a funny feeling he likes it, though. “Honey. Dollface. Sunshine. Sweet cheeks—”

“Ugh, never mind,” Steve says, tries to press his hand over your mouth when you keep going. “I take it back. I take it all back.”

“Fine, have it your way, then, asshole,” you say. You trace your index finger down his nose—a mindless gesture. He grabs your hand when you reach the tip, puts your fingers to his lips. “But I just gotta say, they all make you sound a lot sweeter than you actually are.”

“Fuck you.”  
  
“Fuck yourself.”

Steve grabs you by your dog tags, tugs you into another kiss instead of responding. 

Yeah, okay, you’ll let him win that one.

-

Luxembourg is another success, but it’s riskier. 

Three bases, all cleared, all information passed on to Carter and then you’re getting the hell out of there, heading into Germany and almost, _almost_ catching Schmidt in Trier and only finding an empty stronghold, completely cleaned out. That’s not such a good time. It’s frustrating as all hell, and it seems to set off a chain of events—trails going cold, information turning out to be false, HYDRA catching wind of you coming and skipping town, burning their information, or taking cyanide pills before any of you have the chance to come in.

In Dresden, Dugan and Jones almost walk directly into an ambush that they would have been killed in if you weren’t perched up in a tree, watching their backs.

In Poznań, you take a slug to the gut and the thigh, and it just about kills you, leaves you out of commission for almost a week, but soon enough, the bullet wounds heal up. By that point, you don’t limp at all.

In Lviv, one of Dernier’s explosives set off a minute too soon, and Steve gets buried under a pile of rubble while the two of you are trying to get out, scrambling to grab the information you need. It traps his arms in a way that he can’t pull himself out, leaves half his body buried under a chunk of concrete that refuses to budge.

You don’t sit by and watch. You do what you always do, and pull him right out of the jaws of death.

It’s pure adrenaline that drives you forward, that lifts the slab off of him long enough for him to tug himself from underneath it and roll into one of the few clear spaces left. You tug him up before he can even try to say he’s fine, and sling his arm over your shoulder, and drag him out because it doesn’t fucking _matter_ if he’ll heal in a few hours. If a broken rib punctures his lung, if shards of debris somehow nick an important artery, he’ll be dead as a doornail, serum or no serum.

Right then and there, his breath whistles, and he’s dead weight against you, pale as a sheet, fingers tightening and releasing against your sleeve. You set him against the trunk of a tree once you’re far enough away, wipe crumbs of concrete from his hair, dust from his face.  
  
“You think you can get back to camp?” you ask, hands on either side of his head. “We can wait it out. Still got a gun, enough rations to last the night.”

“No,” he says hoarsely, squeezes his eyes shut, jaw clenching tight. He puffs out a sharp breath that looks like it hurts. “I’ll be fine. Just help me up.”  
  
You can’t imagine what it must feel like, his body knitting itself back together as soon as it’s hurt. Cuts and bruises heal in the matter of minutes, sprains in less than an hour, his constant broken fingers and toes in just about the same time. You haven’t mapped out bigger breaks yet, but you’re figuring it out. Learning the rhythm of his body in more ways than one.

Someone has to keep an eye on Steve, since he obviously isn’t going to be the one to look out for himself, and it’s almost second nature at this point. It’s just different now.  
  
Everything is completely different now.  
  
At the beginning of August, you all meet up with Carter in Vienna, and she asks to ‘borrow’ you for a couple of days while Steve and everyone else cover the ground in Austria. 

There’s just one rule—the missions remain between you, her, and Howard Stark.

Stark flies you into Sofia, and Carter hands you a file with a name, a photo, an address. You don’t miss the shot, and considering what you’ve read, the bastard doesn’t deserve to breathe for another second.

After that, you’re dropped into Kosovo. You have three kills under your belt almost immediately, perched up in the bell tower of an abandoned church, and then you’re gone just as fast, dashing to your rendezvous, and finding Stark and Carter waiting for you with a running motorboat.

“Aren’t you quick,” Carter says when you get into the boat, when Stark immediately sets off. The water is choppy and the wind is whipping at your skin. Your blood is buzzing, leg shaking. You feel alive, and a little sick. “I take it our friends didn’t make it home?”  
  
“Dead as doornails!” you shout over the wind, over the motor. You squint against a gush of wind. “Hey, Howard, does this thing go any faster?”  
  
“‘Course she does!” Howard says. “Why do you ask?”

You think back to the officers who probably found the bodies, who might be looking for whoever shot a Nazi general and two of the most high-profile scientists Germany has. “Just curious!”

-

Your final mission is in Bratislava, and you kill twenty-three Nazis over the course of three days.

Five of those are done with your bare hands, with only a hunting knife and your Colt. One of them tries to gouge your eyes out, but you slip away. Your reflexes are becoming stronger. Sharper. Your kills are more precise, even when they get bloody.

And that’s the thing, you _like_ killing them.

You shouldn’t, but you do. The rush you get in your veins when they meet their end, when you watch a body drop to the ground through your scope. It’s a cold, electrifying sort of thrill, like sucking freezing air in through your nose and holding it in your lungs.

Killing them is satisfying. You’re everything they hate, and sometimes you make sure they know it when they die. Something possesses you on the final kill, and you rip open the Nazi’s shirt, and since he’s not wearing a uniform, since he’s trying to _hide_ , you carve a swastika so deep into his chest, you hit the bone.

It doesn’t matter. They killed men and women and children like you for breathing, for existing, and a little goddamn payback won’t hurt anyway, will it? If anyone’s the fucking vermin, the infestation, it’s _them_.

You’re slick with blood when you get to the rendezvous, a cigarette between your lips, calm as can be, the itch inside of you long since scratched.

“Someone had too much fun,” Stark quips from his seat. You can barely see him in the dark. It’s cloudy tonight. The water is inky black in the straining moonlight.  
  
“Yeah, well,” you say, and shrug. It’s only your sleeves that got wet, anyway. “Won’t mind any blood on your seats?”

“I don’t think Howard has a choice in that matter,” Carter says, and nods at you to get onto the boat. You flick your cigarette onto the ground, and climb in the back with her.

-

“I don’t think we could have done this without you,” Carter says, once the three of you are in a Jeep headed back to Vienna. It’s only been five days, now that you think about it. The guys are probably still knee-deep in clearing up the last of the HYDRA bases. “So, thank you.”  
  
“My pleasure,” you say, and smile wryly. “Might’ve enjoyed it a little too much, but it’s what they deserve.”

“Any plans once the war is over?” Carter asks. Her fingers curl around a handle as the jeep heads over a road of bumpy gravel. “The end is coming a lot sooner than we think.”

 _Na del jakhalo_. Even if it the end is close, you don’t want to think about it. You can’t afford to think like that, can’t bear the thought of jinxing it all in some way. “No plans,” you say. “Just gonna put one foot in front of the other, see where it takes me.”

“You’re a realist, too, eh, sarge?” Stark says from the drivers’ seat. “I’ll drink to that. See what happens when it happens.”  
  
“A-fucking-men,” you say, and shut your eyes for a few minutes, arms crossed tight against your chest.

-

When you get to the safehouse, your body is stiff, but far from tired. Your sleeves have long since dried, and Christ, you need a bath. You need to scrub the filth from your skin and climb out of your head for a while.  
  
“The only reason I ask about your plans,” Carter says, stopping you from heading inside with a hand at the crook of your arm. “Is because I think I might need a helping hand when the time comes. I can’t trust many people aside from Howard, from Steve, and the rest of the Commandos. And you.”  
  
“Well, I’m flattered, Agent,” you say without much humor. “But, look, it’s like Howard said, we’ll see what happens when it happens.”  
  
“We’ll see what happens when it happens,” Carter echoes, and removes her hand. “Just know you’ve got a job if you want one. No throwing yourself in front of a cannon this time.”

“Yes, ma’am,” you say, nod once.

“Oh, for God’s sake,” Carter all but groans, then smiles at you, lips dark like blood under the cover of night. Curls whipped up from the wind. “Call me Peggy.”

And then she’s back in the Jeep, driving off with Stark, surely mapping your next op in her head already.

-

Morita answers when you knock, exactly the way you all coordinated, and then he asks, “What’s the password?”

“It’s ‘lick my ass’,” you deadpan. “Open the fucking door.”

“That’s the one,” Morita says, and you step in, let him drop his arm around your shoulders. “Hey! Look what the cat dragged in!”

“L'enfoiré est vivant après tout!” Dernier shouts.

You’ve spent enough time with him to get the gist of what he’s saying. You surprise yourself by grinning, and clap him hard on the shoulder. “I’m _invincible_ , Frenchie, and don’t you forget it.” You knit your brows together when you see the whiskey on the table. “Where the hell did you get this?”

“Found it in the basement,” Morita says, and tosses you a mug. You catch it. “Better enjoy it before everyone else gets back.”

You pour yourself two fingers, knowing it won’t do much. You don’t really mind it right now; you just need the burn of it running down your throat.

-

“You _asshole_ ,” Steve hisses later that night and crushes you into a hug so hard, it takes your breath away. You shut your eyes and breathe him in, smoke and sweat and blood. “You fucking asshole.”

In a way, you can’t blame him. You fell off the grid for almost a week, with just a gun and your rations. As much as you want to tell him about it, you can’t. The information is too sensitive, and if it gets out somehow, you’ll all be done for. Stark and Carter, too.

“Yeah, yeah,” you say into his shoulder, gripping onto him just as hard. “I know. I’m despicable. The worst.”

When Steve leans back, he grips the nape of your neck, the side of your face, fingers running over your temple, like he’s trying to check you for injuries. “You’re okay, right?” he asks. “Whatever it was, whatever happened, you’re fine?”  
  
No. You feel numb and chilled to the bone, but you can’t tell him that. Can’t tell him about the blood soaked swastika, the way you saw the kraut’s intestines trying to spill from his stomach. 

“Fitter than a fiddle, Rogers,” you say, grab his palm to keep it where it is. You feel like you might be turning a little green, but if Steve notices, he doesn’t say a word. You give him a smile that barely curls at your mouth. “Just need to...I think I just need to sleep for a while.”

You do. God, you _do_. You haven’t been this exhausted since you were in the trenches. You feel like you might collapse on Steve completely if you don’t lie down soon.

“Yeah,” Steve breathes, turns his hand to squeeze yours. “Yeah, okay, Buck, come on.”

He only stays for a minute, surely leaving to change out of the suit for now. You’ve only seen him do a few missions without it, when things were sensitive enough that the distraction had to be the fact that there _wasn’t_ a mass of red, white, and blue running in, guns blazing.

You think he looked more comfortable, then, more like himself. When you said as much, Steve just said, _yeah, well, I think I made my bed with this one._

Speaking of beds, there aren’t any here. You just have your bedroll on a drafty floor, but right now, that feels as comfortable as the bed at the Savoy. You’ve been fighting off sleep for days, since you’ve had no one to watch your back. In the past five days, you must have gotten less than an hour a night.

You don’t bother changing your clothes, you just unzip your bedroll and climb inside, eyes flopping shut. 

If you’ve learned anything in the army, it’s how to fall asleep when you find the time.

-

It must be a long while later that Steve finally comes back, and you feel him untying your boots, pulling them off along with your socks. Christ, you needed that more than you thought.  
  
“Aren’t you sweet,” you mumble into your arm, not bothering to open your eyes. “What would I do without you, huh?”

“Sleep with your shoes on, apparently,” Steve whispers, and then he’s pulling his bedroll closer, crawling in and letting you flop your arm around him, tug his head against your shoulder.

“Yeah,” you say when his arm fits around your waist. “Yeah, something like that.”

-

France is next, but you’re not meant to head into Paris. There’s a massive stronghold in Lyon, and Dernier—who turns out to be a damn good leader—has more than a few connections to get the lot of you safely through the city. The only people meant to be heading to the stronghold are you, Steve, Dugan, and Jones.

There’s no way to run in spraying bullets everywhere. It’s too risky. The four of you scope it out, splitting into pairs and finding blind spots, finding out what time the guards change shifts. The plan is to kill one during that window, and then the other when he leaves his post.

Steve isn’t wearing the suit, and his shield has been painstakingly camouflaged. Again, this is too risky. Word has traveled fast about Captain America and The Howling Commandos, and your faces are on propaganda posters now. Hell, there was even a film crew back in April, making you and Steve look at fake battle plans, showing the Allies and Axis alike how you’re all cracking into this.  
  
It’s the only way your family knows you’re still alive. You have no way of knowing how they are. You can’t send any letters, not now, not when it could blow your cover. Once you make it back to London, you might have the time. Might be able to get a letter to Ma, to Becca, who—

Who’s probably waiting to have a baby any day now.

The last time you got in touch, she was two months away from her due date, feeling all out of sorts and swinging names by you. Hell, maybe she’s already given birth. Maybe there’s a little Baby Barnes-Proctor in the world now.

You’ll find out soon enough. For now, there’s work to be done.

-

The next few months are grueling. You end up back in Italy. Then, Bosnia and Albania and Greece over weeks and weeks of fighting. You can’t keep track of how many men you kill, but it doesn’t matter once you find yourselves in Germany, because none of it can compare to Hürtgen Forest, to the massacre in The Ardennes.

The Ardennes is a tiring, bloody victory, and by the time it’s over, by the time you’re all out along with the other men who survived, you think you might have left some of yourself back in those woods, perched somewhere in a tree, or maybe in the bell tower of the church that half-crumbled to the ground.

There are parts of you littered across the world now, and if you had a map and the gift of time, maybe you’d be able to find them all again.

-

It’s back through Belgium after that. Camping and making your way through the country until you can make it to Brussels and make contact with Carter, get on a train to London as soon as possible to get your heads together before you leave all over again.

You’re too anxious to get back. Too anxious to get to a bed, to get real food in your stomach, and put down your rifle. At first, you think it’s just you, but you can see the weight in everyone’s eyes. See how quiet they’ve become. Everyone is beginning to slip, and no one seems to want to admit it. Especially Steve.

He seems to be doing what he always does, pushing past it all, keeping you all together, and the guys seem to be alright with that, don’t look much closer, since they see him as—

You know they respect him. You know you all look out for each other, have become something like a family, but sometimes you think they get a little blinded. Sometimes, you think they forget they’re following Steve Rogers, and not Captain America.

“You sure you’re alright, kid?” you ask, when he comes to take your watch for the night, stop him with a hand on his shoulders.

“Still kicking, Buck,” Steve says tiredly. “All we can really do right now.”

Sure, that’s true. Sure, that’s what he always says these days, but then you look at him, really look at him, and your blood runs cold when you notice that his eyes are a mirror of yours. 

The war is swallowing you both whole, and you don’t know if it’ll ever spit you out.

-

Your eyes are shut, but you don’t fall asleep for hours, not even when Steve’s watch ends, and he crawls into the tent, slides into the bedroll beside yours.

When you finally do, you wake with animal sounds rising up in the back of your throat and the whisper of screams rasping in your ears, the smell of burnt flesh in your nose. You wake with your heart pounding so hard you think your chest might crack open, but then Steve is hovering over you, hands pressed on your torso to stop you from thrashing or jumping upward. You realize your fingers are gripped around your pocket knife, and you force yourself to let go.

You realize you reek of sweat and fear, and that your face is soaking wet.

Steve stares down at you, eyes determined and serious, even in the dark. You stare right back, and think about shoving him away and turning around or pushing out of the tent for a smoke.

You don’t do any of it. 

In fact, you don’t move at all. 

“I got something on my face?” you croak, and your throat gets tighter with every word

Steve looks beat. There’s a bone-deep weariness you’ve never, ever seen on him. You want to sock a good one to every fucking dickhead in the brass because if the war is managing to distinguish the fire behind _his_ eyes, sap the fight out of him, it really is hell. “I thought so,” Steve says hollowly. “Just turned out to be your ugly mug.”

Your vision blurs and turns the world to a dark smudge. You try to smile at him, but your mouth refuses to move the way you want it to. It wobbles violently, and you have to clench your jaw to stop your chin from shaking. “Fuck you,” you murmur, and you’re so, so tired and so cold, and so far away from home. “Fuck you, Rogers.”

You’re sweating bullets despite the blistering cold. There’s a fine tremor running through your whole body, and Steve’s hands are tight on your shoulders. He sounds wrecked when he says, “Buck.” You can feel worry coming off him in waves, feel how frantic his touches are when his hand slides over your hair. “Bucky, look at me. It’s okay. You’re okay.”

“No.” It punches out of you before you can stop it. You blink, and then you can see Steve clearer. Wetness runs down the bridge of your nose, the sides of your face, into your hair. You hate this. You can’t stand it, being exposed for him and the whole world to see. “No. I’m...Steve, I’m fucked up. I think I—I’m fucked up for good. I got no clue what’s happening anymore, and I don’t know what that bastard did to me but—“

Steve leans closer without being asked, and God, he’s just the same sometimes, even with his big, clumsy body. You tug him closer, just to get some stability, and he lets you. Of course, he lets you. He puts his arms around you and rubs your back, firm and fast, says your name as gentle as anything (as if that _helps_ ).

Steve doesn’t protest when you pull away from his touch, though, when you shift to lie on your back. He just stays close, propped up on his elbow, his hand hand sitting just close enough that you don’t itch under your skin, don’t feel the need to tug him back or push him away.

“I’ll kill him,” Steve says, completely serious. You laugh then, a little deliriously. It’s devoid of humor. A wet, pitiful sound. Maybe you’re not laughing at all, then. Maybe you’re sobbing. Maybe it’s both. You hope Steve doesn’t pity you. “I’ll fucking kill him. All of them, for what they did to you.”

You’d like to see it. Or, no. You wish _you_ could have killed Lohmer with your bare hands. You’d like to see Zola and Lange dying, too, at your hand. Not quickly, though. Something ugly and slow, like they did to you and the guys that came before you. 

“I bet you say that to all the girls,” you say, and then you’re really laughing, and Steve is too, despite himself, a hesitant smile cracking over his face before he’s dipping his head against your shoulder. 

“I hate you,” Steve is snickering. “I really hate you.”  
  
You sniff, hard and thick. “Yeah, well, I don’t like bein’ pitied, anyway,” you say, force yourself to breathe properly, trace your fingers over the short hairs at the back of his head. “So quit your speeches.”

You wipe your face with your palms, swipe them over your eyes, burning with anger, with something like helplessness. 

You don’t want to think about Kreischberg anymore. You’re sick to death of thinking about Kreischberg.

-

Steve is a good distraction. Your head clears a little, and you’re not sparking like a live wire anymore. The shaking has stopped. Now, the only reason you’re shivering is because for the first time in weeks, you’re actually, properly cold. 

You’re both talking in hushed voices, talking about home for a while, since it’s obvious you both want to. It doesn’t bother you, it doesn’t leave you feeling cut up, not really. Yeah, you wish you were there. You miss the apartment, and you miss Ma and Rebecca so much it makes you feel a little sick. Hell, you even miss the Gillespies, miss Pete—who’s out here somewhere, hopefully still alive.

You miss going to Burton’s and getting a grape Nehi and a pack of Lucky Strikes. You miss the dance hall, which always smelled like stale sweat and beer. You miss the chop suey place in Brooklyn Heights, the rugelach from the Cohens’ bakery. You miss your rat trap of an apartment and the way the radiator smelled, and the more you talk, Steve does, too.

He tells you that he misses the WPA, misses Greenwich and the Lower East Side and the art shows, how he and a few other people used to go to Katz’s afterward, tells you how it became a routine without them realizing it. He asks if you remember going to Rockefeller Center in ‘36, and of course you remember. He says he misses walking to Carroll Street Station, misses the rumble of the train beneath his feet, misses the seagulls trying to steal your food in Coney Island.

You both miss the simplicity. As shitty as it all was sometimes, you’d give an arm and a leg to get it back.

There’s nothing else to do now but talk about it. Steve’s watch ended hours ago. So did yours. Neither of you have anywhere to be, and you’ll be damned if you don’t take advantage of it.

“Fuckin’ hate Belgium,” you grumble after a while. “Ain’t you cold?”

“Freezing,” Steve says into the quiet.

“Then get over here, dinlo,” you say, jerk your head for him to come toward you.

It’s like tension is being siphoned from Steve’s body when the words leave your mouth, and when he nods, he exhales all slow. He moves closer and you turn onto your side, his chest to your back, his arm tight around your waist, all his warmth bleeding into your body and yours into his. _Bone of my bone, flesh of my flesh_ , you think foolishly, almost feverishly.

Sometimes, it really does feel like he was plucked straight out of you. Your bodies fit together too well to be the bodies of strangers who found each other in an alley in Brooklyn.

“I didn’t wake you up,” you say, eyes already turning heavy, chest loosening with the pressure of Steve’s body, the beat of his heart against your back. “Did I? Don’t lie to me, Rogers. I know you ain’t sleeping either.”

Nothing for a long while, just Steve tracing mindless patterns into your shoulder. “I don’t think I can anymore,” Steve says quietly, like it’s a secret. “I feel like...it’s like I forgot how. I don’t know how else to explain it, I just—“

“It’s like your brain won’t let you,” you finish for him. You rest your hand against his, eyes on his crooked fingers. “It thinks a bomb might fall on you the second you try to get some shut-eye.”

Of course that’s what it feels like. You felt it every night in Sicily, in Kosovo, in Bratislava, in The Ardennes.

“Yeah, that’s...yeah, that’s about right.” Steve breathes out, and you feel it fan warm against the back of your neck. “I’m glad you’re here with me.”

Absently, you run your fingers over his sleeve before you squeeze his wrist. “Nowhere else for me to be, pal,” you mumble, and you think he pulls you closer, but you can’t be sure. The world sways as you drift, like you’re floating naked in the ocean in Guadalcanal, dried blood and filth sloughing off of your body. “Nowhere else I wanna be.”

You don’t quite fall asleep. You wish it was that easy, but you just hover somewhere close to it with your eyes shut, and for a long while, you forget Steve is there. All you’re aware of is the comfortable weight of his arm around you, hand splayed close to your chest, his legs tangled with yours.

Another scream echoes through your ears, but this time, you don’t jolt awake. You twitch a little, and then your eyes just flip open, and it’s still dark. It can’t have been that long since you’ve drifted off, then. Maybe a half-hour

You become aware of Steve beside you again, since you almost forgot he was there at all, but his body is strung tight like a cord, grip firm on your waist, and you think that maybe he’s dreaming, too, maybe you need to wake him up, like you’ve had to plenty of times these past few months, but as you move to do that, you feel pressure against the small of your back and—

“Steve,” you rasp before you can stop yourself, and you immediately regret it. He tenses up even more. You can already feel him pulling away like he’s been burned, but you snatch his arm before he can even try to get any further.

Steve’s voice is low and raw against your shoulder when he says, “Sorry,” he whispers.

“It’s fine,” you say too quickly, and maybe that makes everything seem wrong for _him_ , because he worms away from you and turns to his other side, leaves his back pressed against yours. Still close, still touching, but you’re colder than you were a second ago. Every part of you that was wrapped up in him is turning ice cold, and now, you can feel your dick swelling against your thigh, pressing against your zipper. The phantom of him lingers against your lower back.

It’s been ages since you’ve had time to touch each other, aside from a little necking when you had the time for it, but that’s the thing. There’s _been_ no time for it, to the point that it feels like it’s wrong to even try, since there’s no point, anyway.

“Buck,” Steve murmurs, and it sounds helpless. You’re wide awake now, aware of how close the two of you are. Ankles touching, elbows bumping, heat still bleeding into the other’s body. You can feel the click of Steve’s throat in your own when he swallows. Or maybe you swallow, too. You aren’t sure, but you know your heart is beating so hard you can feel it in your temples.

“Yeah.” Your voice is tight, like something is clutching your lungs in an unforgiving grip. “Still here.”

Silence, but you can practically hear the cogs in his head turning.

“Steve,” you start, soft. “‘Pal, what the hell is going on with you?”

  
“It’s nothing,” Steve says, and he sounds as drained as you feel. “I mean it, I just—”

“Shh,” you hiss, half as comfort and half to tell him to shut up. You’re aching for more reasons than one now. You flop onto your other side. “Shh. Stop, just...just slow down a second, huh?”

Steve doesn’t move when you scoot closer. He doesn’t move when you slip your arm around his waist and slot your bodies back together. Your mouth is pressed to the nape of his neck now, and he has to feel your dick pressing against him. He has to know, because his heart is beating fast beneath your palm. His skin is blazing against yours.

“Hey, you feel that? It’s not just you,” you murmur into his skin, and feel his breathing pick up. The words won’t stop spilling from your mouth now that they’ve had the chance to come out. “It’s not just you, Steve.”

Heat is flooding into you, fast and overwhelming, and you’re shocked that you can feel it, enjoy it at all. You hand slips downward to splay over the taut skin of Steve’s stomach, running your hand over planes of muscle through his shirt, slow and easy, just craving to touch. The hard line of his back is pressing to your chest. You kiss the knob of his spine, then the skin beneath his jaw, and his pulse thuds against your lips. You linger there for a moment, tasting soft skin, the scratch of his stubble. Steve whispers _Bucky_ , so quietly and shakily, you think he’s just breathing out.

“Tell me this is okay,” you mumble. You kiss the corner of his jaw. “You want this or not?”

His body is a knot of discomfort, and you’re about to stop completely, but then a set of fingers curl around your own, keep your hand in place. “I do,” Steve breathes. “Yeah. I do.”

Your dick twitches painfully against the small of Steve’s back. You roll his hips forward into it, bite back a curse in the crook of his neck. “Then I’ll do it for you,” you say, so quiet even you barely hear it. You pop open the button on his trousers, let your fingers linger around the waistband of his underwear. “Steve. Stevie, lemme do it for you. Lemme take care of you.”

You feel Steve inhale rather than hear it. And then he says, low enough for only you to hear, “Okay.”

So you reach into his boxers, and curl your fingers around him. You’re tentative at first, but then you feel the heavy heat of his dick, velvet smooth against your palm and you begin to stroke him, slow and firm, fingers tight as you move from base to tip, base to tip, the slickness of pre-come already making the slide easier. You wonder how long he sat like that, how long he’s been needing it.

“Tell me.” Your voice is a wreck, your entire body trembling as you feel him meet every movement of your hand. “Tell me if it’s good.”

“Oh, God, Buck,” Steve puffs out, and his fingers tighten around your forearm, body curling inward. It’s a good enough answer, and it drives you insane, drives you goddamn stark-raving _mad_.

The sound you make is completely involuntary, muffled against his shoulder, and you stroke him harder for it, tightening your grip around him, thumbing over the weeping slit of his dick in circles, same like you’d play with a girl, just to see if he likes it. He clenches his jaw tight, whole body tightening with it, eyes squeezing shut.

“Yeah, sweetheart,” you murmur hoarsely into Steve’s cheek, twist your wrist a little, make your strokes firm and short, then long and languid. You flick your tongue over the shell of his ear, rasp your teeth against it. “I know you need it. I got what you need.”

Steve shivers at that. You can feel it in your blood. Can feel his heart pounding through his back, against your chest. “Then don’t stop,” Steve breathes, so low you barely register it, and grinds forward into your fist again, movements a little jerkier than before. “Don’t stop.”

“Don’t stop what?” you ask, maybe a little too teasing. 

You thrust against his ass and stifle a groan against his shoulder. Ghost your free hand over his chest, and squeeze his nipple through his shirt. That earns you a gasp. A hitch of breath. You wonder if Steve would be louder were there any privacy. If he’d moan or curse, or say your name all sweet again and again. Your eyes are pricking with need, with the desperation coiling in your guts and you try to stop the movement of your hips. You stroke him faster, and you can hear the rhythmic smack of skin against skin, the wetness of Steve’s dick caught in your fist.

“Just keep talkin’,” Steve says, and the angle you’re at, you can’t quite see his face, just the vaguest expressions. “Buck, just keep...just stay put.”

 _Piece of cake_ , you think. You ain’t going anywhere anytime soon.

You wish you could get his clothes off. Wish you could feel all of him, and get a better look. Run your teeth and tongue over his skin, suck bruises into his neck, knowing how quickly they’ll fade. “If I could, I’d get my mouth on you right now,” you say with your lips against his ear, and stroke him faster. He curses into the crook of his arm. “Make you feel so fucking good. Bet I’d know just how to do it. Take real good care of you, just like I said.”

Every movement is sending a jolt of pleasure into your veins. Steve moves his ass back against you, and a moan almost rips out of you, but you swallow it down, turn it to something quiet and strangled in the crook of Steve’s neck.

“Buck, Bucky, _Bucky_ ,” Steve whispers it like a goddamn prayer, head tilted forward into his pillow. His voice is broken and lost in his throat. “Buck, I’m there. I’m right _there_.”

The sentence is choked off and turns to a curse and then a moan before he’s shutting himself up, hips jerking and stuttering when Steve comes in hot, thick ropes over your fingers. You don’t stop. You keep stroking him until it finally passes, until he’s softening in your hand and turning slack in your arms, heart pounding against your clean hand. “You’re,” Steve breathes out as you wipe your palm on his undershirt, your mouth smashed against the side of his face. “You’re insane. You drive me insane, you know that?”

“Hm?” you hum, body slow and floaty, and you haven’t even finished.

“Nothing,” Steve whispers, and then he’s turning in your arms, and your heart is racing all over again. He’s so close. Breath in your mouth. Dog tags clinking against your chest. “Come here.”  
  
You’re both moving closer, tugging your bodies together, and before you can think, his hand is down your pants, hot fingers wrapping around your dick and leaving you biting down hard on your lower lip. Hard enough to draw blood as you clutch at him, using everything you have in you not to come right here and now. You breathe in through your nose sharply, out through your mouth, a shaky sound bordering on a sob.

Steve is looking at you. He’s looking right at you like you’ve got the moon and sun and stars coming out of your mouth, face flushed and sweaty, hair damp with it. You tug him closer, and then he does something with his fingers that makes you squeeze your eyes shut, leaves your hips moving of their own accord. You must make a sound because his clammy hand covers your mouth, tasting of sweat and skin, and you probe your tongue against his palm, feel his mouth form a curse against your skin. Steve’s fingers tighten around you, and you arch your hips up to meet him _, once, twice, three times_. You’re hot and cold and within and without and—

Gone. Straight over the edge. You don’t know how you would have kept quiet at all if Steve wasn’t shutting you up, but then his hand is gone and you pull in a gulp of cold air, choke back a moan as he strokes you dry. Fucking _milks_ you, and it stretches on and on, shakes through you and leaves you feeling raw, like you’re naked and exposed to the cold. When you open your bleary eyes, he’s copying your last move, wiping the other on his own undershirt before he comes down again. All heat and slack fingers and shaky breathing. You feel laid bare. You feel like Steve is laid bare, too, like you’re seeing beyond everything and _into_ him.

“Christ,” Steve starts, breathless. “I really didn’t expect that.”  
  
“Yeah,” you say, and Steve lets you pull him in, lets you wrap your arms around his head, the fingers of your left hand threaded through his hair. “But I think I would’ve lost my mind if we went any longer without it.”  
  
“We’ll be in London tomorrow night,” Steve argues. “With a bed. You really don’t think you could’ve waited?”  
  
“Absolutely not,” you say, and his smile is slow and satisfied, probably matching your own. “Once you get me started, I ain’t gonna stop.”

“Is that good or bad?” he asks.  
  
The breath you let out is slower, easier, and you shut your eyes, breathe in the sharp scent of the cold, the smell of the dying fire outside, the headiness of sex. “That’s up to you,” you say. “I think it’s a pretty sweet deal, though.”  
  
“Yeah, that’s the reason I stick around,” Steve picks.

“Shh. Less talking, more sleeping,” you say, continue the path of your fingers through his hair. “Come on, I mean it. I’m beat.”

It’s after a little while, when you’re properly falling asleep that you hear him say, “I’ll wake you up if it gets bad.”  
  
“Yeah, same to you, kid,” you say, and you’re out like a light.

-

You arrive in London to a booked hotel, and a stack of mail.

Vera Barnes-Proctor was born on September 30th, 1943, and you have a whole slew of letters from the past few months about all of it. She’s a fat, happy, healthy baby, who looks just like Rebecca. All dimples and curly black hair and a glint in her eye, a sign of causing trouble.

“She’s gonna be mean,” you say when you show Steve the pictures. “I can tell. Mean and spoiled rotten.”  
  
“No way,” Steve says, shakes his head, eyes still on the picture of Vera in Becca’s lap. “Girls act like their fathers. Or so I’ve been told.”  
  
“No way,” you insist. “That girl is all Barnes, I’m tellin’ you. Not a lick of Proctor in her.”

“She looks kinda like you,” Steve says, turns to look at you. When you roll your eyes, he nudges you hard. “I mean it, she _does_.”

“Fine, I’ll take it,” you say, feeling lighter than you have in a long time. “I ain’t having any kids of my own, so I’ll take Vera, no problem.

-

_Dear Rebecca,_

_I thought I’d address this one to you directly to say_ _CONGRATULATIONS_ _!!!_

 _I’m off by a few months, I know that, but know I’ve gotten all of your letters and all of your pictures. They’re all beautiful. You sure know how to make a guy misty, I’ll tell you that. Vera is the prettiest, fattest baby I’ve ever seen. We did a toast to her last night, even though I wish I would have been able to get in touch sooner. I have one of your pictures in my jacket now_ _—the one of you, Vera, and Ma on the old sofa at home. Three of my favorite ladies._

_Would you believe me if I said I had a funny feeling around the end of September? Call it the Sight, or maybe my instincts, but something told me you already had Vera by that time, or that she was coming into the world sooner or later. I hope you’re doing alright in your new place, and I hope you’re getting some sleep when you can manage it. Scott seems like he’s been a big help, and I know Ma is breathing down your neck with every move you make._

_Between you and me, let her do it. If she wants to take Vera off your hands for a couple days, let her do it. From her letters, I can tell she’s getting pretty sick with work. It’ll give her something to do. You know she doesn’t like to be idle. We both get that from her._

_I hope you get the package I’m sending. It isn’t too big, it’s just the few things I could find. I had to tell the woman at the department store that Vera was my daughter, and I guess she felt bad for me, because I got a pretty sweet deal on everything inside. I hope you like it, and I hope Vera looks nice in blue._

_Write me back when you find the time. Give everyone my love, and that does include Scott. I’d send him a letter of his own, but I’m a little pressed for time. I miss you, Becks. I miss you like crazy. Give Vera a kiss from me._

_Your brother,_

_Sgt. J.B. Barnes_

-

Word is coming in fast. Word of the Axis pulling back, cities being liberated without your help. Little by little, everyone is rising up and fighting back, full of spit and vinegar. It seems that the Allies are asking less and less of Captain America and The Howling Commandos, and it makes moving forward seem just that much easier. 

Most of HYDRA has scattered, some of them giving themselves up, some of them offing themselves, according to reports. Schmidt is still in the wind, hidden away somewhere, surely licking his wounds and waiting to reemerge for one final fight.

Like any of you are going to let that happen.

Right now, Carter is circling around something big, and you think that once she finds it, once she gets her hands on the right information, winning the war won’t feel so much like a pipe dream, and goddamn it, if anyone can single handedly end the Second World War, it’s Peggy Carter.

-

You’re in a newly-liberated Paris, snow falling fast and heavy. The Seine is half-frozen, and you’re so cold your nose is starting to run, but you don’t really care. The business you finished up here is just a finishing touch, getting your hands on a few officers who managed to slip away, to realize the krauts are definitely not winning this one, not with the whole world pushing back at them.

“Say, maybe we’ll come back here one day,” Steve says to you, breath turning to icy clouds in the air in front of him, his cheeks flushed with the cold, even as bundled up as he is. “Once everything’s all over and done with.”  
  
It’s late enough that the streets are almost completely empty, and on the Ponts des Arts, it feels like you can see the entire city. You never got the chance to come here, to see what all the fuss was about, but you’re glad you made it now, now that there’s no Nazi flags everywhere you look, no fear, no bodies in the streets.

As close as the end is, you still don’t like thinking about it, but for now, you swallow it down, because now, the thought of an _after_ is too tempting to ignore.

You bring your arm around his shoulders, tug him as close as you dare. “World’s our oyster, pal,” you say. “You say the word, and we’ll go. Your pick.”

When his hand slides up your back, it’s warm, even through your coat, melting the ice from your bones.

You light up a cigarette as you walk back to the safehouse, which isn’t even a safehouse anymore, it’s just an apartment tinier than yours back at home, functioning as a place to lie your head until you know where you’re going next.

-

The bed is too loud, too creaky, so you do it on the floor with a pillow underneath Steve’s hips and his legs bracketing your waist. It’s the most privacy you’ve had in months. There was no time in London, not with the constant, hours-long debriefings with Carter and Phillips, catching up on sleep, trying to piece together a rational thought.  
  
But for right now, it’s quiet, and you’d be a fool not to take advantage of it. There’s no message coming in until tomorrow night at the latest, and whatever it is, you know you’ll be leaving Paris behind to get it done.

So, when you press into Steve, find a rhythm with him, it’s slow and lazy, seems to go on for hours. In the dim light, he looks soft around the edges, like he’s finally settled into his body. You suck bruises into his throat and his chest, and the spot beneath his jaw, kiss him until your lips feel numb, thrust into him with ease until he says _harder_ , and then you snap your hips forward roughly, pull his knees up until they’re draped over your shoulders. 

He tugs you closer like that, and when you finally come, you muffle your moans and curses into the meat of his thigh, dig your teeth there before you soothe it with your tongue. His release sticks between the two of you, leaves your stomach tacky after you collapse on top of him.

It’s a good night. You’ll say that much. 

You haven’t had a good night in a long time.

-

“Buck,” Steve says much later, so quietly you almost miss it. His breath is hot against your face. You still haven’t moved off the floor, still haven’t untangled yourself from the dusty quilt and each other’s bodies.

“Hm.” You feel a little floaty, tongue heavy in your mouth, thoughts falling somewhere to the back of your mind for once.

“You don’t get drunk anymore,” Steve says, like he’s finally getting it off his chest. He catches your eyes in the dark. You can see him too well, much better than you ever would have before. “You sleep about as much as I do, and you seem just fine. You twisted your ankle, what, a week ago? And you’re not limping at all.”  
  
Your stomach clenches tight. Your voice is hoarse when you say, “Yeah.” You don’t feel any less sated. It’s quiet in the city tonight, in the area you’re in. “But when did you really figure it out?”  
  
It’s Steve’s turn to feel on the spot now. His hand comes up to your shoulder, rubs it slowly. Up and down, up and down. “The second I found you on that table,” he admits. “I saw the syringes. Saw what was left in there, how bright it was. We already heard a few whispers, that HYDRA was trying to make a serum of their own, a better one than Schmidt had. When we made it back to Azzano, you were—yeah, you weren’t yourself, Buck, but you were moving easier than you should have. You looked better than you think you did when you came into my tent.”

You consider it all for a moment, that you’re both, essentially, one and the same now, no matter what the circumstance was. No matter how you got the serum. You know it messed him up, too, even though he won’t say anything about it. 

In the darkness of a foxhole in the Hürtgen Forest, Steve told you that sometimes, he still wakes up and thinks he has his old body. You remember that he told you he feels like he might never get used to it. Not really.

You bite down on your lower lip, trying to find the right words to say. You bring your hand up to his cheek, slide your thumb over the soft skin beneath his eye. “Just keep it between us, alright?” you mutter. “If anyone finds out, they’ll never let us go.”  
  
“I know.” Steve nods, curls his fingers around your wrist. “I know, Bucky, and it ain’t leaving this room. I swear.”  
  
All you can do is nod. “C’mere,” you say against his mouth, shift so he’s lying on his back, so you’re hovering over him, hips slotting back together. “I want a few more minutes with you.”

“No complaints from me,” Steve says, and lets you kiss him, slow and easy.

-

The next day, you’re in Bourg-en-Bresse, tracking down and capturing an SS officer who went AWOL straight from Auschwitz, trying to escape the punishment for the horrors he’d inflicted on hundreds of thousands. Your only objective is to hand him over to the authorities, letting them ship him off to Paris to be dealt with. Your missions have grown smaller, less deadly, less grueling.

The seven of you are in a tavern that same night, toasting with shots of scotch, getting a glimpse of the end that might be full speed ahead.

In the morning, a transmission directly from Carter comes in. When Jones pieces it together, it turns out that you’re headed to Geneva next. Time-sensitive mission. Further details will be given once you get into Switzerland, but it sounds like it’s going to be a big one.

You pack up and pile into Jeeps, heading for the border, and then traveling by foot until you’re met by a young sergeant who takes you to the smallest airstrip you’ve ever seen, where Howard Stark is waiting with a running helicopter.

“Guten Tag, boys!” he calls over the wind, hair blowing into his eyes. “Pick up the pace and get inside!”

-

The safehouse is a farmhouse, hidden in the snowy hills, surrounded by cattle and sheep, smelling like clean, fresh air with a hint of cow shit. You’re not used to places like this. Not even in your constant travels in the past four-odd years. It’s strangely peaceful, but not your cup of tea.

When you get inside, Stark doesn’t leave, since he’s still meant to be your getaway man. “Just like old times, eh, Barnes?” he says as he passes you by, claps you hard on the shoulder. No one else hears that, thankfully.

Carter gets down to business pretty quickly, and she looks a little drawn, a little sharper than usual. Like she’s been as busy as the rest of you. “This isn’t something we can flub up, lads,” she says, hands splayed flat on the map, laid on the table. “If we do this right, we’re one step closer to ending HYDRA for good.”

“Then lay it on us,” Dugan says.

-

It’s a big one, alright. Real fucking big.  
  
You smoke half your pack of cigarettes that morning, breathing in freezing air, unable to deny the way your gut is twisting up, the way your shoulders have drawn up to your ears.

“You know, you can sit this one out,” Steve says, and his hand is firm when it rubs up and down your back. It’s not patronizing, it’s just honest. “Peg said she might need you for something else, anyway.”

You consider it, puff smoke out through your nose.

Carter’s ops keep you busy. Keep you focused in a different way. And running all over Switzerland with her doesn’t sound so bad right now. The two of you work well together, like a fine-oiled machine, and her offer has begun to sound interesting to you. She’s a decent woman. Has a damn good constitution, and whatever she’s running, you have a feeling you’ll all be right behind her.

But you can’t let Steve go into this alone. If you’re not watching his back, who will?

Besides, catching Zola, making him pay for everything he’s done to you, is too tempting to pass up.  
  
“No,” you say, shake your head. You turn around to face Steve, kill your cigarette in the snow. It sizzles faintly. “No, I should be there with you. It’s gotta be all of us on this one. It’s no good, splitting up. We gotta watch each other’s backs.”

“You sure?” Steve asks. “Buck, I mean it.”

You’ve never been more sure of anything. 

You nod, grip the back of his neck and tug him closer. “Now, let’s go get this son of a bitch,” you say.

-

In an ideal world, you’re the one to catch Zola, and the op goes off without a single hitch.

In an ideal world, Carter and Phillips get the right information in the nick of time, and Schmidt goes down with a bullet in his head, sent directly from your rifle. 

In an ideal world, you take your honorable discharge, get a medal for valor, and so does everyone else before you all head your separate ways, promising to stay in touch. By April, you’re on a train bound for New York, Steve sat beside you, and you breathe in damp spring air by the end of the week, almost fall into the East River when you jump up onto the bridge, fingers tight around one of the thick cords holding it together. Your body feels new and elastic and young again, and maybe, you think you’ll be able to leave the war behind.

That’s all a fleeting thought, however, rushing through your head as you run out of ammo, as you feel the blast of a ray gun against Steve’s shield before you’re thrown back, out of the car with only half a mind to grab onto the first thing you see. There’s freezing air in your face, the bite of icy metal clenched in your slackening fingers.

You can see Steve, see his lips forming your name as he pulls himself from the train to get to you, but you can’t hear him. Your palms have frozen to the railing, legs dangling wildly over a chasm of snow and ice, thoughts narrowed to _reach further, reach further, reach further_ when Steve stretches his hand out to you.

The railing screeches under the weight of your body. 

Steve’s fingertips brush yours, but it’s not enough.

You don’t blame him for it. Your own scream echoes through your ears when he tries to reach for you again, when he almost tumbles forward himself. 

A sick, terrified part of you almost wishes he did. You don’t want to die alone.

But you are. Years and years of fighting, a body count that goes up to your eyes, and a life that evidently meant nothing, all ripped away.

The wind is whipping at your face, taking your breath away as you twist into the mountains, the Danube getting closer and closer. You don’t want to land on your face. You hope someone finds your body. You hope someone buries you properly and doesn’t leave you to rot here until the end of time.

You slam against the side of the mountain, reaching out for purchase, but you’re falling too quickly to grab onto anything. Something on your left side rips and cracks and _tears_ and you scream until your throat is bleeding, scream as the ground rushes up to meet you and all you can think is—

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Follow me on [Tumblr](https://tumblr.com/saccharinemornings) if that floats your boat.


	3. NOTES

This chapter is reserved solely for notes, translations, and for readers who have some interest in some more concrete info surrounding the Barneses/Samuels.

There are many different vitsas (subgroups) of Romani people, but I specifically wrote Winnie as Kalderash, since that’s the majority of what’s in the Northeastern USA, and in New York, New Jersey, and Pennsylvania. Obviously, I’m sure there are plenty of other vitsas in those areas, but from what I’ve seen and experienced, others usually tend to be in other parts of the USA.

I’m Romani. I’m Kalderash. So, yay for writing from experience!

I borrowed a lot of little things from old family stories, considering the fact thay my family are from New Jersey and New York, especially my older relatives—my paternal grandparents, my paternal great grandfather, and so on. 

Anyway, back to the fic.

Shaping character voices was fun, because I kind of just let the characters take on their own ideas. Bucky was kept relatively the same. Adding the fact of being Romani was extremely interesting, though. I hadn’t seen many Romani Bucky fics, and I just wanted to do one that was a little more accurate to the Romani-American experience, and because there are a lot, and I mean a _lot_ , of Roma in Brooklyn. Always have been. I spent a lot of time there myself as a kid visiting family.

However, Bucky being half-Romani in this is interesting, because he deals with the torn feeling of leaning into the gadjo world and ‘being normal’, all the while stomping down a whole other half of himself along with his sexuality. 

Another thing: being LGBT+ in the Roma community is extremely difficult. Plenty are shunned or disowned, and it wrecks them, especially when they come from a culture where family is so important. Sadly, most stay in the closet and suffer it out. It’s rare that someone will come from an open minded family.

Onto the fic once more. For Bucky, being attracted to men, being Roma, and experiencing this during a time where homophobia and discrimination was rampant, he doesn’t really have an easy time, so he lives in his lies for a long, long time. The internalized homophobia he experiences isn’t something that truly goes away, and it’s not an easy process for him at all.

Crafting Winnie’s story has been a ball, since, truthfully, it’s not that much of a stretch. There are plenty of stories like that. Almost everyone has one. These days, it’s not strange for Roma to marry gadje— my maternal side of the family has a lot of marriages just like George and Winnie’s—though there’s no bad blood or cutting any family members out—or vice versa: a Romani man marrying a gadji, which happened on my paternal side of the family once or twice.

A few things before I get to the translations, though:

1) If by some chance you don’t know, the G word is a slur. The correct term is Roma or Romani people. 

2) We’re not white. Some are white passing due to some racial makeups or albinism running in a family.

3) Romanian and Romani are not, I repeat NOT, the same thing. Sebastian Stan isn’t Romani. He’s Romanian.

4) Forced marriages are not a thing. No one kidnaps a bride. No one. What the fuck. Arranged marriages exist! Like they do in a lot of other cultures! We’re not the only culture to have arranged marriages! However, I will say they’re becoming less and less common for us as the world and the views of Roma change.

5) Roma have an extremely rich culture. It’s not heavily explored in this fic because Bucky and Rebecca did not grow up around other Rom. Winnie taught them a little, but they never fully experienced it.

6) Bucky is actually a common Romani nickname. I think it’s more popular with Romnichal, but there are a couple of Kalderash guys named Bucky, too. Can’t say I know ‘em personally, but, yeah. Moving forward.

7) A LOT of Nazi human experiments were done to Roma. They were forced to drink sea water and their rations were taken away, so they were thirsty to the point that they licked a freshly mopped floor. They were injected with poison. They were sterilized. They were subjected to electroshock therapy. Four year old twin siblings were sewn together by Josef Mengele, and they died of gangrene days later. I’d stay away from his Wikipedia page. It made me sick to my stomach, and I’m far from squeamish. 

8\. Continuing from above, this is why Bucky is chosen to be further experimented on by Zola and Lange.

DISCLAIMER: There are plenty of different Romani dialects, so while these translations may not be accurate for you, this is what I’m accustomed to. 

To non-Romani readers, there are some words that are a little similar or share the same meaning as a word in another language, mainly Hindi, Polish, Turkish, Russian, and occasionally Romanian or Hungarian

ROMANI TRANSLATIONS:

Arakh, avel palpale= Be careful, come back

Benǧoři = little she-devil

Či kamlem lako prikaza pe muro nevo berš = I don’t want her bad luck on my new year

Če dinli san = What an idiot you are

Če šukar san! Muro papuša! = What a beauty you are! My doll!

Čačo/Čaci = real/true 

Devel, smilujil pe muro duša = God, have mercy on my soul

Devel žanel = god knows

Dosta = enough

Dinlo/dinli = stupid/crazy

Gadje/gadjo/gadji = non-Romani person

Hal’arel = understand

Ikana = saint’s image or statue

Jas palpale = go back

Jas ando kher = go in the house

Kajlo? = where is he?

Kul kiro chav = your son is shit

Mila = pity. if someone says ‘mila’ while you’re telling then something sad, it basically just means they’re going awwww but they really really mean it lmao

Na del jakhalo = literal translation is ‘don’t give it the evil eye’ but what it actually means is basically saying ‘knock on wood’ or saying you don’t want to jinx something.

Ni lasho. Tehara, ili aventehara = not good. tomorrow, maybe the day after.

Osh! = shh/shut up!

So keres? = what are you doing?

Te merav mey = for me to die

OTHER TRANSLATIONS:

À bientôt = see you soon

Joyeux anniversare, beau = Happy birthday, handsome

Ein anderer Amerikaner. Derjenige über den Lohmer mit lhnen gesprochen hat. = Another American. The one Lohmer talked to you about.

Er ist wach, schick ihn mit den anderen = He is awake, send him with the others

Giacomo = James

L'enfoiré est vivant aprés tout! = The bastard is alive after all!

Mio angelo! Mio caro! Torna da me! = My angel! My dear! Come back to me!

Mischling = half-breed

Pezzo di merda! = Piece of shit!

Vaffanculo! Lascialo in pace! = Fuck off! Leave him alone!

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Again, thank you so much for reading. Much love xx


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